Abyei Report – A test to Sudan peace deal
Abyei Boundaries Commission: A Reply
By Douglas Johnson*
Mar 1, 2006 — Dr Elhiraika’s comment contains a number of inaccurate claims about the
Abyei Boundaries Commission report which require correction. As one of the
international experts who contributed to the report, what I write here I
write on my own behalf, but it repeats some points that other members of the
ABC and myself have made since presenting the report to the Presidency on 14
July last year.
First, we did not exceed our mandate, but fulfilled it to the letter. The
mandate (agreed by both sides before the ABC was appointed) was to define
and demarcate “the area of the nine Ngok Dinka chiefdoms transferred to
Kordofan in 1905”. Thus we had to determine what constituted the whole of
the nine Ngok Dinka chiefdoms in 1905 – not just part of them – what
territory they occupied, what territory they used seasonally, and what
territory they laid claim to at that time. Readers of the report (which is
accessible via Sudan Tribune and a number of other websites) can judge for
themselves how we fulfilled that mandate.
Second, we never declared that we could not identify “that triangle”. What
we said was that there was no contemporary map or report that defined the
area under discussion. We therefore had to define it using the evidence
available to us, gathered from a variety of sources. That was stipulated in
our mandate.
Third, we did not reject the evidence presented to us by the government. Our
duty was not to find in favour of one or other of the parties, but to
collect all the evidence each party presented, and examine it against such
additional evidence as we were able to collect ourselves. What we did
conclude was that the evidence presented did not support the government’s
assertion that only a small triangle of land south of the Bahr el-Arab was
transferred to Kordofan. Whereas the government cited only extracts from the
sources they presented, the full documents revealed the confusion in
administrative minds about which river was the Bahr el-Arab. There is no
ambiguity in the contemporary sources that stated that the Dinka lived both
north and south of the Kiir (the Dinka name for the Bahr el-Arab). One
source even placed the “Bahr el-Arab” fifty miles to the north of the
“Kiir”. This evidence is laid out in full in the Appendices to the report.
Fourth, because our mandate confined us to investigating the situation as it
existed in 1905, we could not take into consideration developments that
post-dated that time. It is true that Misseriya now live in Meiram, but
Meiram was built along the railway line by the government, and it had not
been established in 1905. Nor were there any oil wells drilled in 1905. The
government delegation was adamant that we confine ourselves to the state of
affairs in 1905, so I do not see how we can now be faulted for having done
so.
Fifth, the writer dismisses our application of dominant and secondary rights
to land, as recognised by customary law applied in the Sudan under the the
Condominium when the transfer was made. We did not feel that we could
dismiss such established legal practice so arbitrarily. Our mandate
stipulated that we arrive at our decision using “scientific” means, which
meant not only applying historical methods to interpret historical evidence,
but understanding the legal regime affecting land use and land occupation.
The critics of the report have not attempted to apply “scientific” methods
to refute the ABC’s conclusions. They have merely restated their
propositions as if these were proven, when in fact they were not.
Sixth, it is false to state that the Ngok were invited to settle north of
the Bahr el-Arab by the Misseriya. This is refuted by the oral histories of
the Missseriya that were collected and published in the 1930s and 1950s,
before Abyei became an issue. It is refuted by the contemporary
administrative documents from the beginning of the 20th century. The claim
was first publicly made by Nazir Babu Nimr at an inter-tribal meeting
chaired by Munim Mansour, Nazir of the neighbouring Hamar, in 1966, and it
was rejected as false then. Munim Mansour was a Muslim and a respected
tribal elder, and his decision was recorded in our report. Many Misseriya
may still believe this claim, but unfortunately they presented no evidence
to the ABC to substantiate their oral testimony, and the other evidence we
had at our disposal conclusively refuted it.
Seventh, on at least three different occasions during the ABC deliberations
appeals were made to the two sides to reach their own accommodation and
present it to the Commission. One of those approaches was made by the
Chairman of the commission at the very outset, another was made by one of
the African international experts before the final submissions of the two
sides, another was made by Ngok intellectuals independently of the
commission. In each case the suggestion was rebuffed by the government side.
We were told by the leader of the government delegation – who is a Misseri
himself – that there was no possibility of a compromise. If the Misseriya
and Ngok had been allowed and enabled to reach an accommodation between
themselves within the negotiations of the CPA, there would have been no need
for the commission.
Eighth, I do not know the religious affiliation of the five experts, as it
never came up amongst us, and I never asked my fellow experts what their
faith was. And since some of the Ngok Dinka who presented evidence to us
were Muslim, and many were neither Muslim nor Christian, it was not an issue
relevant to the deliberations of the ABC as a whole. I should add that the
experts included only two khawajas, and the other three were highly
respected African professors.
Finally, it is absurdly false to claim that the ABC proposed to extend the
boundary line to change the boundary between Darfur and the South. This is a
complete fabrication.
I am concerned that this is the standard of argument now being aired to
avoid the implementation of the ABC report. A number of allegations have
been made about what is contained in the report which are unsupported by any
verbatim citation. In the rules of procedure adopted by the full commission
(both Sudanese delegations as well as the experts) it was stipulated that
the report be publicised once it was presented to the presidency, and
translated into both Arabic and Dinka so that the widest possible public
would know its contents. Up to now the presidency has declined to publish
the report, which is why inaccurate and distorted claims are now circulating
so widely. Those who have read the full report have a duty to represent it
accurately to those who have not.
The charges that the international experts were biased and motivated by oil
are serious ones and require substantiation. If they are offered without
substantiation, then they must be dismissed and withdrawn.
The fact of the matter is that in the CPA both the government and the SPLM committed themselves to accepting the findings of the ABC as final and binding and implementing them immediately. That was agreed between
themselves, not imposed on them by foreign experts.
* Dr Douglas H. Johnson was a member of the Abyei Boundaries Commission. He
can be reached at [email protected]. www.jamescurrey.co.uk