By Jacob Onuha Nelson
The Governor of Northern Bahr El Ghazal State (NBGs), Simon Ober Mawut, has suspended the State Minister of Roads and Bridges over alleged mismanagement of 60 million South Sudanese Pounds (SSP).
In a gubernatorial order extended to the media, the governor indefinitely suspended the minister citing gross insubordination and misappropriation of state resources.
However, the suspended Minister, Carolina Achok Akot, refuted all the charges labelled against her.
“In exercise of the powers conferred upon me by the Republican Decree No. 172/2024 read together with Article 99(2)(a) of the Transitional Constitution of Northern Bhar El Ghazal State, 2012 as amended, I, Simon Ober Mawut, Governor of Northern Bhar El Ghazal State, do hereby issue this Gubernatorial Order for the indefinite suspension of Hon. Carolina Achok Akot from her position as the state minister of Roads and Bridges with effect from the 25th of August 2025 AD,” the gubernatorial order partly read.
Meanwhile when contacted Ayuel Chan Ayuel, the press secretary in the office of the governor confirmed the suspension.
” She is insubordinate and undisciplined. She refused to attend the commissioner’s forum, which was recently concluded last week, to present her ministry’s report. Then she’s also misappropriated about 60 million SSP that was generated from an investment,” Chan said.
He claimed that the minister failed to provide a legal agreement for the local company she owned as well as doing assignments in the state.
“The governor asked her to provide an agreement that she signed with the local company to give her that land. There is no agreement. When the local company was asked how they acquired the land, they said they gave her 60 million,” Chan explained.
“She took the money because the land was for the national government land, actually, for the railway projects.”
However, in response to the gubernatorial suspension, suspended Minister Carolina Achok Akot refuted the allegation, citing that the governor’s charges were intended to tarnish her image.
“The charges which are stated in No. (1), saying that I have not been operating in my ministry office and council of minister’s meetings, are false and baseless. I have never missed the council of ministers meeting while I am here in the state of H/QR, maybe I missed it when I was in Juba for an official mission, the same as my ministry office duties,” Achok said.
Achok stressed that she refused to attend the commissioners’ forum with an intention not to betray the governor with malpractices and the powers in the state.
She stated that the issues to do with gross indiscipline and insubordination were all about the product of disarmament and mistreatment; she felt exhausted with your leadership and remained hopeless with the analysis of the assumption of the need for leadership.
Achok disproved the accusation of charges to do with unauthorized seizures of assets for personal use.