Writes Jerry Okungu in Juba, Sudan.

How time flies! On that fateful day, July 30, 2005, I was in Hargesia, Somaliland meeting political party leaders in preparation for their then forthcoming parliamentary elections. Then a Somali colleague dropped a bombshell on me….. John Garang, the commander of the SPLA who had just been sworn in as Sudan's First Vice President and Southern Sudan's President three weeks earlier was no more. He had died a few hours earlier in a plan crash on his way from Entebbe!

A year later, last Sunday, I found myself praying at his grave side while waiting for the Southerners to commemorate his death in their own style.

The hot and dusty town of Juba did not deter thousands of his followers from congregating at his graveside to remember their fallen hero. And they came in all forms, sizes and colours. Women, men, children, the old and the young; all of them found a place to sit or simply stand in the midday sun and hear speeches delivered by their surviving leaders about their departed hero.

Listening to speeches by the Sudanese leadership in the South including Rebecca Garang and her daughter; listening to some politicians and journalists two days before this memorable day, one had the impression that Garang's death was a bitter pill to swallow for most Southerners whether they shared Garang's vision or not.

There is a certain bitterness running through many people's conversations.

There is a general distrust of the Garang report. It may take more commissions to unravel the truth.

It is agreed in many quarters that the tendency of the chairman of the Garang Commission to break down and cry every time he tables the report is more telling in more ways than one. Southern Sudanese are at a loss for words and wonder aloud why a former president of Southern Sudan, a seasoned old man who was a friend of Garang should break down and cry in public! What they are asking is this: does he know more than the report is giving to the public? Is the report doctored and has made him a prisoner of conscience?

Speaking at the first anniversary of her father, Garang's daughter talked of bitterness and anger that she and her family have lived through for one year. She was at a loss to explain why what happened to her father had to happen.

When her mother, Madame Rebecca Garang stood to speak, she was blunter than her daughter. She acknowledged having received the report but appeared not to believe its conclusions. To illustrate her point, she referred to the tradition of her Dinka community.

She explained that among the Dinka, if a man lost his cow, he would search and search until he either found the cow or established the truth about the missing cow, that a Dinka would sell up to four cows and spend the resources in establishing the truth about the lost one.

In concluding her speech, she conceded that John Garang was not coming back her but swore that the cause of his death must be known.

Most Sudanese I talked to, even expatriates who have lived in Juba for the last year and more seemed to share her view; that the mystery of Garang's death; his behaviour in the last few days before he met his death beg more questions than answers.

Most Sudanese have not come to terms that Garang was hardly three weeks into the Government of National Unity as the First Vice President yet he opted to go for a private visit to Uganda in a UN aircraft then departed late in the evening aboard another aircraft given to him by Yoweri Museveni. Sudanese are wondering aloud why he made that fateful trip in the first place under very mysterious circumstances. They are also eager to know what transpired in discussions between Garang and Museveni, the last person to speak to him and the nature of the mission.

More importantly, the Southerners are curious to know if any other person or groups of persons other than Museveni and Garang's aides knew of that fateful trip.

They are keen to know if the top leadership of Sudan had an idea that Garang was on a private trip to Uganda and if so for what purpose. And if they knew, why didn't they provide him with official Sudanese transport and security?

Speaking to one Member of Parliament and a veteran liberation comrade of many years, there were many signs and hints that powerful forces; both local and international, were already scheming to eliminate Garang once he signed the peace deal with Khartoum. In his mind, Garang died because powerful forces; some of who were foreign, could not trust him with vast oil resources of the South. He was too radical, too independent and too charismatic for their comfort. They feared his ability to galvanize the people not just in Southern Sudan but in the whole of Sudan and the Eastern Africa region. They realized that he would not be easily manipulated hence he had to go to pave way for a more moderate leadership.

This feeling was reinforced by the fiery speech delivered by the charismatic governor of Equatorial State in Juba on the first anniversary of Garang's demise. He was categorical that the Garang draft report did not contain "what he was hearing. What he was hearing was not included in the report!"

Due to his nature and type of politics, most Sudanese knew that if he stood for presidency of the United Republic of Sudan against Bashir in 2008, he would win with a landslide. It was this fear that made Garang a target of assassination sooner rather than later even if he didn't die in a plane crash on July 30, 2005. But again, assassinating Garang either in Southern Sudan or in Khartoum would have plunged the country into untold suffering and a vicious civil war. This explains why killing him in what would look like an accident from a mysterious mission abroad would be perfect.

Now the question most Southerners are asking is this: who were the architects of Garang's mysterious trip to Uganda at the time he did it and why? If he went to Uganda in a UN aircraft, why didn't he use the same aircraft to come back to Rumbek? What necessitated the change of aircrafts? Did the UN crew refuse to wait for him? Did Museveni suspect something and thought Garang would be safer in his Museveni's aircraft so late in the evening? Could this aircraft have been a target of the LRA or some other third force?

Prof. Taban Lo Liyong doesn't mourn Garang as much as he mourns the vision of John Garang. According to Lo Liyong, Garang seems to have died with his vision and the Comprehensive Peace Agreement he signed with the North.

He sees no current leadership taking the South anywhere. He contends that a year later, everything seems to have come to a standstill.

There is no reconstruction going on. Oil money is still not coming to the South; instead, a few leaders in the South are already diverting funds to build mansions in their homes of exile like Nairobi, London and the USA. Most Sudanese workers in the South have gone without salaries for months. Banditry and ethnic killings are still prevalent. Most of the accords signed in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement have not been implemented.

He sees thousands of NGO workers; white and black with big fuel guzzlers and wonders whether they are in Juba to develop Southern Sudan or simply to have a good time.

He muses that since the peace agreement last year, Ugandans, Kenyans and Congolese have virtually invaded Juba with all manner of trade; both legal and illicit. Juba; previously known as the largest grass city in the world is slowing becoming a slum city; thanks to the annoying shanty cultures of Kenyan and Ugandan hawkers.

As Salva Kiir grapples with the stewardship of the New Sudan, one thing is clear; that the issue of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) must be resolved sooner rather than later. Most Southerners know that the LRA was not formed by patriotic Northern Ugandans to fight for their own liberation from Museveni's dictatorship. It is common knowledge that the LRA was a creation of the regime in Khartoum to fight and scatter the SPLA in the South.

According to the Sudanese, the LRA has in the past twenty years, caused as much havoc and mayhem in Southern Sudan as they probably have caused in Northern Uganda. There are living examples of children kidnapped and turned into sex slaves, people's ears and limbs chopped by the LRA soldiers, homes raided and cattle driven into the forests for slaughter by the LRA marauding bandits.

The reason the Sudanese are supporting the LRA peace accord with Uganda is simple; they are tired of war.

In their own words, they are tired of war; war of any kind. They don't want another bush war with these thugs who will consume more resources and human lives to disarm.

More importantly, since the signing of Peace Accord with Khartoum, the regime in Khartoum has cut off supplies of arms and food to the LRA. Now Kony is vulnerable enough to discuss peace.