The signing of the revitalized peace agreement has not led to the immediate implementation of outlined provisions hoped for by the “ordinary people” of South Sudan. Yet, where and when news of peace arrives, sometimes with the support of the United Nations peacekeeping mission, as we shall see in the case of Isaloru in Eastern Equatoria, there is hope that it will prevail.

The challenges involved in spreading the word of what has been agreed by higher-ups in the capital Juba are formidable. Poor telecommunication and road networks and the relative inaccessibility of hinterlands, coupled with prevailing security risks, often mean that information and instructions travel slowly.

Commanders and other crucial stakeholders in faraway locations on the ground may have to wait for months, or more, to receive them, and the implementation of peace accords will suffer.

“It is good that we have received physical copies of this command order in the presence of the rank and file of our division. Sometimes when we communicate orders without the backing of such physical evidences our subordinates think we are making things up,” says Brigadier General Thok Chuni Yok Kuai.

He and his men from Division 9 of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army in Opposition are based in Isaloru. In its perpetual quest to inform, monitor and facilitate peace, an integrated patrol of UN peacekeepers have braved the tortuous, lonely and bumpy dirt road that leads here.

They have come to deliver the “command order” referred to by the Brigadier General, issued by opposition leader Riek Machar on 3 February, pursuant to a 2014 communiqué stipulating the prohibition of all sorts of sexual violence within the framework of the cessation of hostilities agreement.

Machar’s February dispatch orders strict compliance with the commitments made in the 2014 communiqué by all loyal forces, including the one to publicly denounce acts of sexual violence at the highest level and in the strongest terms. A pertinent reminder, perhaps, in a time where reports claim sexual violence  abounds, and where opposing parties accuse each other of perpetrating these acts.