{"id":42350,"date":"2026-01-22T14:44:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T12:44:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/?p=42350"},"modified":"2026-01-22T14:44:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T12:44:07","slug":"ssra-leadership-assesses-nimule-exit-road-construction-amid-funding-hurdles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/2026\/01\/22\/ssra-leadership-assesses-nimule-exit-road-construction-amid-funding-hurdles\/","title":{"rendered":"SSRA Leadership Assesses Nimule Exit Road Construction Amid Funding Hurdles"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Kei Emmanuel Duku <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

A critical artery for South Sudan\u2019s trade remains caught between fiscal bottlenecks and local anxieties as high-ranking tax officials descended on the border town of Nimule this Tuesday to salvage a project stalled by the nation’s banking woes.<\/p>\n

According to a statement posted on the tax collector social media post, The South Sudan Revenue Authority (SSRA) sent its heavy hitters Col. Wani Joseph Loku, Deputy Commissioner for Compliance, and Zizi Maksudi, Deputy Commissioner for Trade Facilitation to the construction site of the Custom exit road. Their mission was to troubleshoot a vital link to the Rock City parking yard that is already four months behind schedule.<\/p>\n

While the machinery is finally humming, the project\u2019s heartbeat is faint. Originally slated for a July 2025 launch, contractor Rhino Stars and Supply didn\u2019t break ground until November. The culprit is not a lack of will, but a lack of liquid cash.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government might release the funds on paper, but the banks are often empty,\u201d said Apollo Robert, the site and material engineer, standing amidst the half-finished earthworks. \u201cIt creates a domino effect. We can\u2019t pay our local laborers, we can’t secure materials, and the community starts to lose faith.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beyond the balance sheets, a more human conflict is brewing over a single drainage culvert. The engineering team finds itself caught between a rock and a schoolhouse.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a delicate balancing act,\u201d Robert noted. \u201cOne group of residents is terrified of seasonal flooding if the culvert isn\u2019t built. Meanwhile, the administrators at Hai Kenissa Primary School fear that installing it will funnel a torrent of water directly onto their playground. We are trying to explain that we are simply following the natural flow of the land.\u201d<\/p>\n

Col. Wani Loku took a firm but diplomatic stance during the inspection, leaning on the contractors to prioritize hearts and minds alongside asphalt and concrete.<\/p>\n

\u201cInfrastructure cannot be built in a vacuum,\u201d Col. Loku told the team. \u201cYou must sit down with these people. Open a dialogue. We are here to facilitate trade, not to create a rift with the citizens who live in its shadow.\u201d<\/p>\n

The SSRA\u2019s visit underscores a desperate push to modernize Nimule\u2019s infrastructure\u2014a move seen as essential to boosting the country\u2019s struggling economy\u2014even as the shadows of a fragile financial system and local environmental fears loom large over the construction site.<\/p>\n

Nimule serves as the primary land gateway for South Sudan, handling the vast majority of goods entering the country from the Port of Mombasa via Uganda. The “Custom exit road” to the Rock City parking yard is designed to alleviate the chronic congestion of heavy-duty trucks that often paralyze the town’s narrow streets.<\/p>\n

However, the project has become a microcosm of the broader challenges facing South Sudanese development a disconnect between central government budgeting and the liquidity of the commercial banking sector, combined with the complexities of urban planning in rapidly growing border communities.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Kei Emmanuel Duku A critical artery for South Sudan\u2019s trade remains caught between fiscal bottlenecks and local anxieties as high-ranking tax officials descended on the border town of Nimule this Tuesday to salvage a project stalled by the nation’s banking woes. According to a statement posted on the tax[Read More…]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":42351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,79],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/funding.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42350"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42353,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42350\/revisions\/42353"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}