National Security suspends construction of Luri detention facility over shortage of funds

May 13, 2020 Military, News, Newsbeat, South Sudan

An image showing a construction site(Source: supplied)

May 13, 2020 (SSNN) – South Sudan’s National Security Service (NSS) has suspended the construction of a new detention facility at Luri, an area outside Juba where President Salva Kiir’s cattle farm is based, over shortage of funds.

Quoting an unnamed national security officer, the independent Nyamilepedia reported last April that the South Sudan notorious security body was planning to build a new detention facility in Luri due to shortage of detention centres.

South Sudan News Now (SSNN) learned early this month that the construction indeed began with a Chinese construction firm carrying out the work.

However, speaking to South Sudan News Now this afternoon, a security official said on condition of anonymity that the construction has installed due to lack of fund and would continue once the funds needed are availed by the ministry of finance.

“The construction has stopped because there is no money. The ministry of finance is said to be working on the issue and the construction will continue once the funds are availed,” the officer said.

The officer said the Internal Security Bureau (ISB) at the NSS decided to build that facility because the current two facilities, one inside the headquarters in Jebel and the other on the Nile Chroniche, were “not enough to accommodate all the NSS detainees.”