Sudanese Arab media told to stop “witch-hunt” against new veep

Text of commentary by Alfred Taban entitled “Let us speak out: Still on the politics of separatists” published by Sudanese newspaper Al-Khartoum, BBC Monitoring Middle East.

Sept 4, 2005 (Khartoum) — The Arabic press has consistently pressed on First Vice-President Salva Kiir on the issue of unity or separation to the extend that it has almost become a witch hunt. Many times Kiir has said he is a unionist but the hammering has continued. The government-owned Al-Anba newspaper has gone as far as quoting Kiir as saying that they in the Sudan People Liberation Movement (SPLM) have killed separatist in the south.

The Arabic press has almost made Kiir a hostage who has to distance himself as much as possible from the separatists in order to be accepted as a leader in Khartoum and in the south. This kind of arrogance has to be terminated. The SPLM went into the Naivasha peace talks with an open mind. It made proposals that could have united Sudan but it was rebuffed. It said secularism is the best way of life for Sudan as everybody would be equal but the government refused, saying the shari’ah of God would not be removed from their lives. The SPLM said okay, at least make Khartoum , a shari’ah-free enclave. The government also refused saying the Arab city of Khartoum would not be made the capital of vices. The idea was dropped and shari’ah was confirmed in northern Sudan and secularism was made the way of life in southern Sudan.

Then the SPLM proposed that let there be a rotating presidency, whereby President Umar al-Bashir would lead for three years and Dr John Garang was to take up the presidency for the remaining three years of the interim period. The unionists in the SPLM thought if Garang was the president as the southerners went to vote at the end of the transitional period, then most of them would vote for unity as they see their man at the helm.

Alas, this proposal was completely unacceptable of the government. Now who should the press be pressing on their separatist views, Salva or the government? The answer is obvious, because it is the SPLM leadership including Salva who have been struggling for unity but it is the government that has been rejecting these overtones.

There is more the oil revenues were divided up neatly- fifty. Who is responsible for this division? The SPLM was asking for 90 per cent for the south to help in the economic rehabilitation of the south as the place is in ruins. The 50-50 division is in itself a separatist tendency, for which neither Salva nor the SPLM is responsible.

The only thing in the entire Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that shows that the government and the SPLM to work towards making unity attractive. The mere fact that making unity attractive was put in the document shows that unity was no longer attractive. This is where what is ascribed to Kiir by Al-Anba comes in. If unity was already unattractive, that implies that the majority in the SPLM are already separatists. So the SPLM would have to kill most of its members in order to achieve the objective of unity. That can hardly be taken seriously. What is clear is that the SPLM has done all it can to unite this country but it is the authorities in northern Sudan who are completely against unity.

Currently, there is the struggle over the energy and mining portfolio which southern Sudan wants and richly deserves. But who is reluctant to give it up? Almost all the southern separatists are not home grown. They are product of the northern Sudanese school of injustice.