Ex-presidential advisor quits SPLM over leadership crisis

January 3, 2013 (JUBA) – A former advisor to South Sudan president Salva Kiir has resigned from the country’s ruling party (SPLM), saying its current leadership was “leading us nowhere”.

Rev. Tigwog Hadher Agwet, until recently Kiir’s advisor on religious affairs, said it was time for citizens to speak the “truth for change”, citing the ongoing political unrest in the world newest nation.

“Dear friends, in light of the crisis South Sudan is experiencing, I had to take this decision of resigning from SPLM, the party I first joined up to this moment”, he said in a 30 December letter addressed the party’s chairman.

“From here, I can freely contribute to the peace of our beloved nation”, adds the letter.

The senior SPLM official, in his letter, also blamed the “genocide”, which allegedly happened in the capital, Juba and other parts of the country on the weaknesses of the ruling party leadership.

“The [SPLM] chairman is being circled with closed group that blocked him from being accessed with the advices that could improve his leadership to the party,” he said.

He said he opted, as a loyal member of the SPLM guided by its code of conduct, not to openly express his views in media outlets, but peacefully resign from the party.

Rev. Agwet was appointed advisor on July 11, 2011 after several presidential decrees were issued in the aftermath of the country’s independence from Sudan.

(ST)