Sudan’s Salva Kiir asks Lakes foes to resign from parliament
By Manyang Mayom
December 14, 2008 (RUMBEK) — The president of Southern Sudan arrived in Rumbek on Saturday afternoon from Bentiu and requested that two foes resign from the state parliament.
The Deputy Speaker Marik Nanga Marik will take over as acting speaker until a new speaker is elected in Lakes state parliament. Itto said that the SPLM party should take the lead.
President Salva Kiir Mayardit, who serves also as First Vice President of the Republic of Sudan, appeared at Rumbek airstrip in a helicopter that arrived at 4 p.m. Saturday. He was accompanied by high-ranking officials, cabinet members of the Government of Southern Sudan (GOSS) and the governor of Lakes state.
For the first time in the three year history of Lakes state government, a security team of state police forces and security agencies in Lakes state set up an unusually strong perimeter to keep out the public, MPs, state advisors, ministers and media at Rumbek airstrip who had gathered for the reception.
Kiir last visited Lakes state on October 8, whereupon he decided to reinstate Lakes State Speaker Isaiah Alier Mashinkok and his deputy Marik Nanga Marik, who both had been impeached on September 24 by a coalition of executives, the SPLM Lakes state secretariat plus 23 MPs.
According to Luka Biong, the GOSS minister of presidential affairs, Kiir affirmed that the Assembly has a right to function and the resignation of Speaker Mashinkok and Bullian will allow harmony among the SPLM members in the Lakes parliament.
The Lakes state assembly political turmoil has now been solved on this track; Biong said that the previous directives that were left by President Kiir were not followed, so the president told Mashinkok and Bullian to resign immediately.
The president proceeded on Sunday to Malou Infantry School for a ceremony to graduate an unspecified number of senior officers.
All in all the president was expected to be proud of the people of Malou for showing so much support and excitement over his visit. The officers in Malou were to give him a warm welcome, putting on their best together despite contention over salaries.
The issue of the Lakes state minister of finance, trade and industry has been downplayed, but a top government official said that he too will be removed from his ministerial post.
In October, the Assembly crisis were very intense and Kiir held a meeting at Palm-tree hotel after which he told journalists at Rumbek airstrip that the “meeting ended very well, reconciliation has been made and everybody has been told the truth. Whatever the complication that might have been happening has been put straight and everyone is now happy.”
However, Kiir left Rumbek for Juba and the Assembly crisis erupted again on the same track.
On November 25, the presidents of the high court of appeals in Lakes state sent Justice Daniel Deng to swear in three members of NCP in the presence of Speaker Isaiah Alier Mashinkok, but the procedure failed due to the Assembly’s failure to come together. The anti-speaker groups interrupted the swearing-in ceremony and described Speaker Mashinkok as not eligible to swear in the three new MPs.
The continuing turmoil prompted Kiir on December 1 to direct the state’s acting governor, Awan Guol Riak, to close down the assembly for 14 days until Governor Daniel Awet Akot returned from medical treatment in Germany.
(ST)