Bride Price Fuelling Cattle Raids: MP

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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Gumuruk Member of Parliament in the volatile Jonglei State, Judi Jongole Boyoris has said that a cattle rustling is creating problem in the state as many people look for cattle as way of survival and solution to marriage.

He said that the “people of Jonglei are all poor, and the way of going for cattle raiding is actually the only way of survival.”

The MP said that if one has no cattle, then he will remain poor and if they have other channels to get resources for themselves then majority of them will avoid the practice.

“If I work at the moment and I want to get marriage, I have to use my money to buy cattle and then I bring my wife and this is the good channel people should follow,” the MP told Gurtong.

He urges the youth to avoid the cattle rustling and look for other ways of surviving because there are so many way of getting rich in the country.

“I encourage youth actually that there are so many ways to get cattle… not only through grabbing somebody’s belonging,” he said.

He said that the current way of keeping cattle is not a good way for the youth as though they have thousands of cattle, some time they get hunger and do not benefit and the good way is to cultivate and embark on agriculture as the former governor brought more tractors to the counties to boost cultivation.

Among the Murle, the maximum pride for marriage is 55 cows which is considered too high for the local youth to manage.

He says they cannot decide it in the state parliament but the communities need to meet and decide on a fair bride price as the high number will encourage cattle raiding.

In May, Kuol Manyang Juuk, the former Governor, urged the community especially in the greater Bor area to reduce the bride prices to seven cows.

He urged the government officials who have knowledge of marriage to try to discourage the cases of traditional marriages that don’t comply with modern way life.

“Now that there are communities who do not pay cattle [cows], they will be encouraged to marry from these communities who pay such expensive dowry, then we will remain separate and anything that divides us we should remove it,” he said.