Komiru covers three residential areas, including Referendum, Mangateen and Eden.

The chiefs say some alleged senior SSPDF officers, who have assumed ownership of the communal land, are allocating it.

Chief Ladu Morbe identified some of the soldiers as Luka Kuot Deng, Peter Lou Kot and Abraham Ngong Manyuon.

Speaking to Eye Radio, Chief Ladu appealed to the 12-member land committee the president formed recently to intervene.

“Those land grabbers are the ones now demarcating land in Komiru-1, the way they know, they always demarcate the plots and sell them from 100 to 200 square meters,” Chief Ladu said.

“We complained to a high level committee to look at this matter so if they want to save us and avoid land grabbing they should come and see because this is our last piece of land.

The chief says the land grabbers have illegally renamed the grabbed lands.

“They [land grabbers] have reached the stage of renaming these areas like referendum and its original name is Komiru and another place was rename Mangaten and it is still Komiru and another place also renamed Eden and it is still the Komiru.”

“Now they [land grabbers] are demarcating the land and selling it to people, therefore, we are demanding that the land be returned to us the people of Komiru from the land grabbers.”

For his part, another area chief, Tombe Wani, said the local community wanted their grabbed land returned to them.

“We want our land to be returned back to us, if you are a peaceful person and we have a piece of land it is us to give to a person who wants a piece of land. Not a person grabbing and later demarcating to other people,” Chief Tombe Wani said.

“You come and grab, and later you come back to the area chief to give you the land title in Eden, Jondoki or Lonye. Give back our land, we have documents of those plots.”

In August this year, President Salva Kiir issued an order forming a committee to address issues of rampant informal settlements and land grabbing in the capital and its environs.

The 12-member committee is co-chaired by Michael Chanjiek, the national minister of lands; and Emmanuel Adil, the governor of Central Equatoria State.

The committee is mandated to map out areas affected by informal settlements and land grabbing in Juba City and Juba County, including estimates of populations, household numbers and other related demographic data.

It is also tasked with ascertaining the causes of informal settlements and land grabbing in Juba County.

According to the order, the committee may summon and interview any person or persons including community leaders where it is appropriate to establish any information relating to the subject matter.