South Sudan president denies regretting secession from Sudan

November 3, 2017 (JUBA)- South Sudan’s president Salva Kiir did not regret the secession of South Sudan from the Republic of Sudan, according to his spokesman. Presidential spokesman, Ateny Wek Ateny said the comments of President about secession vote, were taken out of context.

“What President Kiir said was in line with the mutual notion of one people living in two independent sovereign states. In other words, the President meant the peoples of the Sudan have always been one, and because of the political and socio-economic injustices that led into two devastating civil wars against marginalization, the people of the then Southern Sudan were eventually given the right to self-determination– of which they including the President, proudly voted for,” said Ateny in a statement.

The presidential aide was attempting to make clarifications to statements in which President Kiir is widely recorded saying secession was not the most choice of everybody but people had to follow the decision of the majority in a democratic situation.

The remarks received many interpretations, with government critics and opposition supporters calling for President Kiir’s resignation from the power if the secession was not his choice.

However, Ateny, in what appears to be an attempt to deflect public attention from growing, said President Kiir would not regret secession because he was one of those championed the right of the people of South Sudan to Self-determination which calumniated into secession in which he became the first president of an independent state of South Sudan.

“He proudly became the first ever South Sudanese to be President of an independent nation-state. the President of the Republic of South Sudan H.E. Salva Kiir Mayardit has never said anything that intends to play down the hard-won sovereignty of South Sudan,” he stressed

President Kiir, according to his spokesperson, is proud of South Sudan being a sovereign state and his visit to Khartoum for bilateral talks cannot change his vast legacy.

(ST)