S. Sudan’s ruling party meeting opens Thursday in Juba: official
January 05, 2016 (JUBA) – South Sudan’s ruling party’s (SPLM) extraordinary convention will commence on Thursday in the capital Juba, senior officials disclosed.
“Those items that will be debated and if there are discrepancies, we shall vote to express the approval of that item in the constitution. That is very important and that is a democratic process,” Makueng told reporters at SPLM general secretariat in Juba.
All SPLM members who attended a similar meeting in 2008 are invited to attend but armed opposition leader, Riek Machar, is not in Juba to participate in the gathering, he added.
“If he (Riek Machar) had come, he would assume his position [as vice chairman of the SPLM,” stressed Makueng.
He cited reinstating of Pagan Amum to the post of secretary general of the party in July when he returned to Juba. Amum is leader of senior SPLM officials detained at the onset of conflict in December 2013. Upon their release in April 2015, Amum and ten other politicians formed a third bloc known as Former Political Detainees (FDs) without joining the government or armed SPLM in opposition.
The FDs signed the August peace agreement and will appoint two ministers. Amum has not returned to the country since signing the peace accord in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in August. Machar is expected this month.
The SPLM national liberation council meeting of 2013 triggered the violence when senior party members disagreed on the constitution and mode of voting. Makueng, however, said those differences were addressed by the party’s reunification agreement reached in Arush, Tanzania in January 2015.
“Pagan was reinstated as the secretary and up to now he is still the secretary general of the SPLM,” he said when asked if the Arusha reunification deal was still relevant.
“So people who will not come for whatever reason – not feeling well or because they sick, that will be understandable. But otherwise, we are already united and we want only to complete the document so that the party can register,” he said.
The SPLM in opposition members who arrived Juba last month said they will not participate in the extraordinary convention, citing absence of their colleagues including their leade from Juba.
Stephen Par Kuol, a former minister in Jonglei state, said the SPLM-IO helped in the drafting of the SPLM constitution and manifesto that will be passed during this week.
(ST)