South Sudan invites Garang Memorial University students to attend July 9 celebrations

By John Actually

June 17, 2011 (BOR) – The Government of South Sudan (GoSS) through the Ministry of Regional Corporation has invited student union representatives from the Garang Memorial University of Science and Technology to attend South Sudan’s independence declaration on July 9 in Juba.

South Sudan will be declared independent in less than three weeks following the January plebiscite in which South Sudanese voted by 98 percent to secede from the North.

The region was granted to the self determination vote by the virtue of 2005 peace accord signed between Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), South Sudan’s ruling party and National Congress Party (NCP) that rules the North. The deal ended over two decades civil war between North and South that killed more than two million people.

The letter released by the minister of regional corporation, Deng Alor Kuol in Juba was disclosed to students by the university’s dean of students Majok Kelei on Friday, June 17. The announcement was made as the new student union was with Jacob Achiek Piok, as the new student union chairperson and his cabinet assumed their offices.

Both the outgoing and incumbent student leaders, Thon Chol and Jacob Achiek respectively welcomed the invitation on behalf of the students and promised to attend with out failure.

The new student chairperson told Sudan Tribune that he is happy for the special recognition the Government of South Sudan has on the Garang Memorial University by inviting them to attend the historical day in Juba.

“I am happy to hear that we, the students of Dr. John Garang Memorial University of Science and Technology have been invited to attend the celebrations in Juba on July 9”, Achiek said.

“It will be a very important day to all southerners and we shall attend without failure”.

Dr. John Garang Memorial University of Science and Technology is among the new universities in the South that were established after peace between North and South Sudan.

It is named after the leader of the SPLM who led the former rebel movement from its inception in 1983 until his death months after the Comprehensive Peace Agreement was signed in 2005.

(ST)