The convoy of the Vice President of South Sudan, James Wani Igga, has been attacked by rebels of the National Salvation Front (NAS).

Wani’s convoy came under fire on Wednesday evening when it was ambushed by the rebels at his home village of Lobonok, south of the capital, Juba, Central Equatoria State.

Six of his bodyguards were shot dead and another two wounded in the attack, Kristina Reports has learnt.

One of the vehicles in the Vice President’s convoy in which the bodyguards were travelling in was destroyed and burnt by rebels from the National Salvation Front (NAS).

Incidentally, the Vice President was not in the convoy when the attack took place.

The group was yet to issue a statement in the aftermath of the attack.

James Wani Igga, born in Lobonok, Juba County, Central Equitoria State, is one of five Vice Presidents in the South Sudan’s Transitional Government of National Unity (TGoNU). He is in charge of Economic Affairs.

He was previously the Speaker of the National Legislative Assembly from 2011 to 2013 and Secretary General of the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement (SPLM).

Security operatives have already been deployed in the Lobonok area following the incident with a mandate to fish out and apprehend the culprits.

It is said that although the influence of the National salvation Front (NAS) is limited beyond the Central Equatoria region, it has continued to fight both the government and Sudan People’s Liberation Movement in Opposition (SPLM-IO) forces in the area despite the 2018 revitalized peace agreement and the formation of the TGoNU in February 2020.

The NAS is led by a former general in the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA), General Thomas Cirillo, who is demanding independence of Equitoria from South Sudan.

Ethnic tensions in Central Equatoria have been flamed by the division of the Nuer and Equatorian communities between the SPLM-IO and rival rebel groups such as the NAS since the September 2018 peace agreement, as well as the government’s use of the Mathiang Anyoor Dinka militia in the region in 2017.

Tonight’s attack is a repeat of its April 2018 attack on Vice President James Wani Igga’s security team. It was reported then that the rebels killed two of his bodyguards in an ambush on the Juba-Lobonok Road.