[citation needed] The newspaper was established in 2004 by a group of displaced Southern Sudanese and students from Juba University in Khartoum, who were brought together by Hildebrand Bijleveld.
It appeared initially in Khartoum as an unlicensed bi-lingual (Arabic/English) weekly before the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was signed between the Khartoum government and the Sudan People's Liberation Army on 9 July 2005, leading to the Independence of South Sudan on 9 July 2011.
The paper was issued a license by the National Press Council on 23 March 2005, but almost immediately ran into difficulty.
[citation needed] Following reports by the newspaper on the expulsion of internally displaced persons from a camp in Khartoum and closing of the daily newspaper The Khartoum Monitor, The Juba Post was shut down by the government and three of its reporters were jailed on the charge of being "illegal journalists."
Over the years, a number of its editors and managers have been arrested by authorities after publishing articles concerning ethnic tension, lack of rule of law and corruption.