Rebecca Nyandeng calls for reconciliation ahead of SPLM convention
December 9, 2015 (JUBA) – Rebecca Nyandeng, wife of late John Garang de Mabior, founding leader of the ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), has called on South Sudanese rival leaders to launch a nationwide reconciliation plan ahead of the SPLM extraordinary convention scheduled to take place on Saturday, 12 December.
“The momentum in which the Arusha reunification agreement was reached should be maintained because many believe unity of the SPLM is the unity of the country,” Nyandeng said on Tuesday.
“SPLM is a historical party with many people having attachment to it and they feel that it is good to resolve differences through dialogue,” she added.
She revealed that in her recent meeting with vice-president, James Wani Igga, and members of former detainees, they discovered that one of the challenges the South Sudanese leadership should address together as the first priority was to silence guns and embark on reconciliation process in order to take the country forward.
“The biggest challenge today is to unite the hearts of our people through a national reconciliation process because there is no path towards nation building and reclaiming our pride as people of one nation if we don’t take bold decisions and reconcile our people,” she said.
The former presidential advisor who fled the country and lived in the neighbouring Kenya in a self-imposed exile, however said she hoped the upcoming extraordinary convention of the SPLM leadership would be an opportunity for the leaders to pledge commitment to pursue national reconciliation in a country still divided by a war resulting from attempts to reform the ruling party in 2013.
SPLM split in November 2013 when its top leaders could not agree on the way forward, particularly on democratic processes and political reforms as well as on leadership succession and intra-party elections of top leaders.
The differences centered on the type of documents to adopt including the party’s constitution, manifesto, code of conduct and rules and regulations. Nyandeng also together with the armed opposition leader, Riek Machar, who was the party’s first deputy chairman and Pagan Amum, secretary general, announced their interest to contest for the chairmanship position in an upcoming convention of May 2013.
When the differences resulted to military clashes on 15 December 2013, Nyandeng accused the country’s president, Salva Kiir, who also chaired the party, of dictatorship and massacre of members of the Nuer ethnic group in the capital, Juba, sparking the war. She then fled the country and only returned to Juba last week in the company of former detainees, a group of 10 senior party leaders who were once detained, released into exile and returned to the country this month.
But while Rebecca is keen to speak about reunifying the party, supporters of President Salva Kiir are unlikely to accept radical institutional reforms prerequisite for reconciliation and to change the way the government had been running the affairs of the country before and after independence in 2011.
Although it is unlikely to bring about immediate change as it is unclear what exactly it will look like in the coming months since the government “does have an impact to the extent that it is a step in the right direction”, Rebecca believed it could be a preliminary step in what is likely to be a long road.
“In order to halt blood-letting and stabilise the situation, I appeal to the government, particularly the president himself and the parties in peace process to refrain from making sensational statements and commit ourselves to implementing the peace agreement,” Nyandeng stressed.
“Peace is the priority of our people,” she emphasized.
The appeal called on global community to support launching a political dialogue on the basis of the IGAD brokered peace agreement in August which calls for the formation of a transitional government of national unity to run the country for 30 months before elections can be conducted in 2018.
Nyandeng however said the peace agreement is at a critical stage and needed support from the international community in order to survive.
“The peace agreement which has been signed is at [a] critical stage and it is time the international community come together to launch a political process to make parties work together, government and opposition,” she further stressed.
She pointed out the need to halt offensive operations by the government’s military forces and armed rebel units in the country, particularly in the conflict affected states of Upper Nile region.
She also called for compliance to security provisions in the peace agreement which call for redeployment of all the forces to positions from which they cannot shell themselves and to halt both ground attacks and air strikes.
She also called for deployment of international observers to monitor the ceasefire, the unconditional release of all prisoners, the establishment of corridors for refugees and humanitarian aid, and the dispatch of aid to rebuild infrastructures which have been the brunt of intense fighting in the conflict affected areas.
“I believe that a strong demonstration of commitments, translating words into actions is needed now. The leaders should reach mutual understanding on the steps that will facilitate full implementation of the peace agreement,” she said.
However, observers fear that the rush by the SPLM and former detainees to conduct a partial extraordinary convention without the armed opposition faction led by Riek Machar, will further widen divisions between the factions of the ruling party and become counter-productive to the spirit of Arusha reunification process.
It was the second time the movement split in 2013 after the first split in 1991 over whether or not to fight the 21 years of war with Sudan for the objective of the right to self-determination for the people of South Sudan.
The two factions, led by Garang and Machar, respectively however reunited in 2002 with the understanding to accommodate both the objectives of secular united Sudan advocated by late Garang and self-determination leading to independence for the people of South Sudan, which Machar advocated, resulting to the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in 2005 and independence of South Sudan in 2011.
(ST)