South Sudan's Minister of Health Yolanda Awel Deng speaking to Eye Radio on 28th Sept. 2022. Credit: Charles Wote/Eye Radio

The National Minister of Health has clarified that donors are not remitting their money directly to government institutions in South Sudan, but that the funding meant for humanitarian aid is channeled through implementing partners.

Answering questions from journalists upon her return from the UN General Assembly on Sunday, Yolanda Awel Deng, said the country is under zero cash policy which prohibits donors from dealing directly with the government.

The minister appeared to clarify queries from citizens on why relief organizations and international development agencies are pouring in millions of dollars annually yet there is hardly any improvement in the country’s humanitarian situation.

“We are under zero cash implementation which is also another form of sanction, we don’t deal with donor funding 100% percent. If donor give us money, it goes through the international UN system and we tell them what we want and how we need it to be done.”

Awel underscored that South Sudan has been placed under the form of financial sanction since 2013 – a decision which invokes additional controls to mitigate financial risks.

Instead, she said cash donations are channeled through a UN systems and that the government’s role is only to design projects that would utilize the funding with no direct dealing with the donation.

Minister Awel further revealed that the current government-led multi-donor Health Sector Transformation Project (HSTP) is being run by the government without direct access to the money.

“That HSTP that is taking over from Health Pooled Fund is being run through multi-donor trust fund. (I am saying this) because some of you have been saying we bring donor money and we don’t explain how it is used.”

“How it work is this; we design and present projects with government contribution to it which is called co-financing because South Sudan is under zero cash policy. This project that we secured no longer ago, it is government led but we don’t hold the money.”

“We just made the description of how this thing should be implemented based on localization agenda base on sustainability and resilience agenda.”

The donor community has been keen about corruption in the government specially after four billion dollars meant for reconstruction of South Sudan after 2005 Khartoum-Juba peace deal were squandered.

Ever since, the troika countries and EU have funded the government through partners to deliver much needed services to suffering citizens.