Protection officers of the SPLM-IO splinter group leader General Johnson Olony disembarked from a plane at Juba airport. April 22, 2023. | Photo: Courtesy.

At least 36 members of the security team of the SPLM-IO splinter group leader General Johnson Olony arrived at Juba International Airport on the weekend.

The delegation comprising security officers arrived from the group’s headquarters in Mangenis Upper Nile State.

General Olony, a former senior army commander in the Northeastern Upper Nile State, is expected to return to the capital next week – for the first time in nearly 10 years.

Major General Jacob Komondan Paul, the commander of the security team said their arrival affirms commitment to implement the security arrangements provided for in the 2018 peace agreement.

“We thank the government for the good hospitality since our arrival from Al-Mangenis to Renk, then Palloch, until our arrival in Juba, and we are very happy for the support and services that were provided to us,” General Komondan told the media at Juba airport upon arrival on Saturday.

He added: “We are ready to move forward in implementing the peace agreement.”

The SPLM party of President Salva Kiir and the SPLM-IO Kitgwang signed the Khartoum Peace Agreement to end the factional conflict in Upper Nile and Jonglei states.

But General Simon Gatwech later abandoned the agreement after allegedly voicing reservations about the terms of the deal.

The advance team of the Agwelek faction first arrived in Juba early last year and met President Kiir.

Their leader General Paul Achut Nyibek welcomed the security delegation at the airport and said General Johnson Olony will be in Juba before May.

“We are here today at Juba Airport to receive the special security guard of the General Johnson Olony. Thirty-six security personnel have come to Juba as advance security team ahead of Johnson coming,” he said.

“Surely, he will arrive in the country within a week from now. Being here for more than a year is a powerful message of peace because peace does not come overnight. Peace requires patience and perseverance, that is why we have been sitting here for a year and more.”

A month after the agreement, President Kiir granted amnesty to the Agwelek and Kit-Gwang forces of the SPLM/A –IO splinter group.

Meanwhile, the two factions have reportedly been involved in a vicious cycle of violence in the Upper Nile region between August and December last year.