FILE PHOTO: Former Mayor of Juba, Kalisto Ladu speaking to Eye Radio in an exclusive interview on Monday. (Photo: Lou Nelson/Eye Radio).

The wife of former Juba Mayor Kalisto Lado expressed her dilemma, stating she no longer knows what to tell her children. She has been telling them that their father travelled to Kenya, but almost three months after his disappearance, she is yet to receive any information about his whereabouts.

Kalisto Lado was arbitrarily taken on the night of 30 March 2024, near his home in Juba by officers allegedly from the National Security Service – reports the latter has not confirmed.

His wife, Ann Grace, reported that Lado was beaten and forcefully taken away in a Noah vehicle by 10 uniformed officers and three others in plain clothes.

In a statement to Eye Radio in April, the police denied any involvement in his arrest and detention.

Since the arrest, Kalisto Lado’s family has neither seen nor heard from him.

They remain unaware of his location, his fate, or the identity of those holding him.

“He has now spent two months and 20 days—almost three months. If we reach the 30th of June, it will be three months,” she said in an interview with Eye Radio.

“I was supposed to have information if I was talking to him on the phone, but I couldn’t hear from him. I always got people saying, ‘Your husband is there,’ or something like that, but I don’t believe them.”

Grace explained that she is in a difficult situation, adding that she has been telling their children that their father had travelled to Kenya to protect them from the harsh reality.

“I am facing a lot of questions from my children: ‘Where is our father? When is our father coming back?’ because I lied to them. I am forced to lie to them because if I told them the truth, it would affect their education,” she said.

“My firstborn is 8 years old, and the next one is 6 years old. They can understand if I told them their father is detained, and it would affect their education.”

“That’s why I am forced to lie to them that their father has travelled to Nairobi. But they ask me, ‘He travelled to do what there?’ I told them for work.”

She added that the situation at home has become very challenging, as she is unable to support the children and relies on family and friends for sustenance.

Grace said she urgently calls on the authorities or those responsible for the former mayor’s detention to release him or bring him before a court of law.

“I want to tell the government that if somebody commits a crime or makes a mistake, the best way is to open a case against that person. The aggrieved person should have filed a police case against Kalisto.”

“So, based on everything I have seen on social media, whether speeches, videos, or anything else, he did not insult the government, nor did he insult the president or anyone else.”

“If anyone had a problem with him, whether it was the land grabbers that he repeatedly talked about, they should have taken him to court.”

“I wish they open a case against him so that the matter can be resolved in the court between the two parties. And that he should not have been taken to a place where no one could see or talk to him. This is unfair.”

Unconfirmed reports circulated on social media said the Government of South Sudan has brought five charges against Kalisto including conspiracy, subverting a constitutional government, and supplying weaponry to insurgents, bandits and saboteurs for terrorism.

The other charges are possession of dangerous weapons and publishing or communicating false statements prejudicial to South Sudan.

But his lawyer, Advocate Santino Wani reportedly defends that the charges are meaningless unless must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt because to become a crime, the three elements of preparation, execution, and completion must be available in all the crimes or else there is no crime committed by the suspect.