One of the only functioning Firefighter trucks in South Sudan - COURTESY

South Sudan’s Civil Defense force lacks equipment and the only functioning Firefighter truck that normally responds to fire outbreaks in Juba often breaks down, the Minister of Interior has disclosed.

Mahmoud Solomon says the Civil Defense Service has qualified officials, but they are not able to respond effectively because they lack a fire engine, hose reel system, and gas system among others.

He says the only fire truck often breaks down while on its way to respond to fire outbreaks.

Minister Mahmoud is calling for more support to the department to deliver its mandate.

“Civil Defense Service is one of the most important institutions within the Ministry of Interior and it has a ready force to deliver its mandate, but they don’t have any equipment to deliver its mandate. This issue of Civil Defense has been ignored for a quite long time,” said Mahmoud.

“In Juba here, we have only one car, an old car, whenever there is a fire and we send it, it will never reach the destination, it will get some problem on the way, and it stops, and the fire will continue damaging the whole properties of the citizens. This is the situation we are in,

“We don’t have a single firefighter at airports across the country, except Juba airport, it is UNMISS that controls our airports with their firefighters.”

According to the 2011 constitution, as amended, the Fire Brigade Service is tasked with preventing and protecting the people of South Sudan and their property from fire and disasters.

Members of the public have often criticized the government, particularly the fire brigade for doing less or nothing about fire outbreak mitigation and control in the city and other towns across the country.

They called on the government to reform the Fire Brigade Service to help prevent the recurrence of fire razes in the country.