Thousands greet Sudan’s president on southern tour

By MOHAMED OSMAN, Associated Press Writer

MALAKAL, Sudan, Jan 11, 2005 (AP) — Sudan’s president vowed to rebuild his country’s war-ravaged south as he continued his regional swing Tuesday to celebrate the peace treaty that brought an end to a 21-year civil war, the African continent’s longest conflict.

Some of the 10,000 people attending a rally in Juba, Sudan Monday Jan. 10, 2005. (AP).

More than 15,000 mainly Christian southern Sudanese crammed Peace Square in central Malakal, capital of Upper Nile state, to greet Omar el-Bashir, whose Islamic-oriented government had battled rebels in and around this city for years during a war which killed more than 2 million and displaced another 4 million across the region.

“From now on, there will be no more fighting, but development and prosperity,” said el-Bashir, who was later made chief of a local tribe by elders. “We will build schools and hospitals and provide clean drinking water, electricity and development projects.”

The oil-rich region needed to end its dependence on foreign relief assistance, the president added, and become self sufficient by cultivating its own arable land.

El-Bashir’s government signed a peace treaty Sunday with the Sudan People’s Liberation Army to end a war that began in 1983 after southerners rose up seeking autonomy and control of their resources.

Sectarian divisions overlaid the conflict, with southerners being ethnically African and follow Christian and animist faiths, while northerners are generally Arab and Islamic.

Rebuilding has been the catch-cry of el-Bashir’s regional tour, which began in the southern garrison city of Juba on Monday and has included visits to smaller, outlying villages where hundreds have greeted him.

The region has seen little redevelopment in half a century, despite sitting on proven reserves of 635 million barrels of oil. With the arrival of peace, experts predict oil and gas companies will rush to exploit the oil.

U.N. envoy to Sudan Jan Pronk is expected to brief the U.N. Security Council later Tuesday on the deployment of a peacekeeping force to the south. Last month, Pronk said he envisioned the council’s adopting a resolution authorizing a U.N. peace mission of 9,000 to 10,000 troops.

The accord provides for northerners and southerners to share legislative power and natural resources. Southern states will be secular, while the northern ones will observe Islamic law. SPLA leader John Garang, who fought government forces for decades before signing the peace deal, will become first vice president.

Southerners will also be able to vote in a referendum on self-determination in six years’ time. El-Bashir’s pro-development speeches could be aimed at winning over southerners who may be leaning toward secession.

“Garang and el-Bashir have said the peace will be 100 percent, and the people are happy for that,” 18-year-old student Francis John Ajac said as he gripped an SPLA flag during el-Bashir’s Malakal rally.

The president also flew by helicopter to nearby town of Punjak, where on landing he was joined by hundreds of locals on a 15-minute walk through scrub to visit a local hospital and school before returning to Malakal.

In the evening, el-Bashir attended a concert on the picturesque banks of the White Nile along with 3,000 people locals, including officials. In scenes unimaginable in Islamic-oriented Khartoum, belly shaking women performing traditional dances swirled around the smiling president backed by drum-beating musicians singing local songs.

El-Bashir is expected to return to the capital Wednesday.

The peace treaty has raised hopes that a power-sharing formula can be reached to halt fighting in Darfur, a vast region in western Sudan where tens of thousands of people have died in conflict that began almost 2 years ago.

Tuesday was the second of a three-day truce in Darfur agreed to enable workers to immunize 1.3 million children against polio, which re-emerged last year after being eradicated in Sudan in 2001.

The three-day polio program, which will see 40,000 people immunizing 6 million children across the country, is being coordinated by the Sudanese Health Ministry, World Health Organization and the United Nations children fund, UNICEF.

A campaign to immunize 1.9 million children in SPLA-controlled parts of southern Sudan will begin Jan. 17.