South Sudan’s Juba Archdiocese Suspends Public Mass over COVID-19 in Neighboring Nations

South Sudan’s 16-member high-level task force committee on COVID-19 Pandemic announced Monday, March 23, the decision to close Juba International Airport and all borders to Juba.

“All international flights destined to, and from Juba International Airport/Airstrips are advised to cease their operations by midnight 24^th March 2020,” reads the communique seen by ACI Africa.

The exceptions of the closure are food cargo flights, aircrafts in state of emergency, flights passing airspace, humanitarian aid operations, alternate aerodromes identified in the flight plan and technical landings in which passengers will not disembark. 

The government of South Sudan has also closed all border crossings involving passenger buses and vehicles, permitting only cargo buses, food trucks, and fuel tanks.

Following the same directives, the Primate of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan (ECSS) and the Metropolitan Bishop of Juba Diocese, Justine Badi Arama, announced the suspension of all church activities for the next one month in a bid to prevent the spread of COVID-19 before any case of the fatal disease is reported in the country.

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“All Christians should remain at home and pray from home with their own families until we get directives from the government that it is safe to congregate again,” ECSS’s Bishop Justine Badi Arama directed in his Monday, March 23 letter.

So far, the war-torn oil rich nation has not reported any case of COVID-19 but neighboring countries in the East African Community (EAC) such as Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Kenya have confirmed cases of the infection.