Why US Economic sanction is good for South Sudan

By Tugul Nyak Diew*

July 15, 2006 – First Vice-President of Sudan and President of S. Sudan, Salva Kirr Mayardit is feeling a mounting pressure from President Omer al-Bashir to use his positive image in the world community, to persuade leaders, such as the President of the United States George W. Bush, to lift economic sanctions imposed on Sudan government by Clinton administration in 1997, due to Islamist administration support of terrorism and it hostile behavior to it people. The question, we the Southern, aught to ask, and rightly so, is lifting the economic sanction is in the best interest of the South or it can benefit only the government of Omer al-Bashir? The simply answer, in my humble opinion, is no. For many years, President al-Bashir has known as a man who can do everything, for his is own survivor, regardless of any price, be it a blood of his fellow country men. He knows is well isolated from the international community and because of this he restlessly work hard to try to find ways to survive and one way to do it is to use a dividing rule, inciting violence amongst tribes and by using others to fulfill his interest. He has done it to Dr Riek Machar Teny-Dhurgon, who is currently the Vice President of GOSS, when he signed the so called Khartoum peace agreement in 1997. He used Dr. Riek as his face mask until Dr Riek saw his empty promise and defected back to the SPLM/A.

Once again, President Omer al-Bashir is back to his old trick. He is now pressuring Salva Kirr and other officials like Lam Akol who have contact with the outside world to talk to the world leaders about the beautiful things Omer al-Bashir has done, while he keep doing what is does best, which is killing, torturing, and by using South Sudanese to fight one another. The selection of Lam Akol to Foreign ministry was not coincidence. It was a skillful plan and excellence political move, if I may add, by the president of the republic of Sudan to appoint outsider who is not part of the guilt regime, so that he could deal with foreign issues. The problem with that is President Omer al-Bashir just thought of buying time as he was doing in the past. If he was sincere about peace he would not have taken all the important government positions such as minister of defense, minister of mining and energy, and minister of finance. We know what happened when the GOSS tried to take the position of the minister of mining and energy. It almost lid a fire and the CPA was about to collapse.

Many analysts and the base majority of South Sudanese people seemed to be caught by supervise, for the government refusal to grant either minister of mining and energy or finance to the GOSS, but it shouldn’t come as supervise to all of us. The governments of Sudan made it abundantly clear during the peace negotiation that they would not share the oil revenue with any one. As you may recall, the Sudanese Government told US government that they would not negotiate oil revenue with the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Amy (SPLA). They argued that oil is a national wealth owned by the Sudanese people and should not be object of compromise. However, this is weak argument. If the oil is a national wealth, owned by it people, as they claim to be, why we don’t share it fairly? And, if the GOSS does not get what it suppose to be getting why it should lobby the international community to lift economic sanction? According the CPA, the central government should help rebuild the physical infrastructures, perform basic government functions, build up the civil administration, and rehabilitate and construct the social services torn a part by war before the referendum in 2011; instead we are seeing quiet the opposite. The government of Sudan fails miserably to do what it promises it would do for the people of South Sudan. The face of rebuilding process has been very is slow. Even the President of the South Sudan, Salva Kirr complained last year about the lack of commitment from the central government. He said and I quote, “we have not yet started even to do anything in the south”. He went further to say that northern government of President Omer Hassan al-Bashir was responsible for much of the delay. If this is the case, why we have to appease this manipulative government who do nothing, but to oppress it people.

There are thousands reasons the sanction should not be lifted. As we speak there is a genocide going on in Darfur and the government is doing nothing to stop it. The refusal to allow UN to take control of the situation shows that the government has something to hide. It shows that it does not want the world to witness the reality and the reality is the government is just trying to hide it poor human right record. Numerous human rights organizations have publicized the Sudan government’s lack of respect for individual freedoms and religious liberty. It also documented that janjaweed fighters are organized under Sudan army. According Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, janjaweed operates in unison with government troops, with total impunity for their massive crimes. If this going on, one need to ask what President El-Bashir has done that would lead to the lifting of the economic sanction. To his credit, he ended the North-South war, but this would not have happened if it wasn’t the strong pressure he received from the international community. Despite the strong pressure from the international community, he still bullying the world and continue cheating the peace agreement. Not long a go, if I recall, when Vice President and president of South Sudan, Salva Kirr Mayadit went on the air, complaining about the lack of the government transference and commitment to peace. Mr. Mayardit insisted that he hasn’t fully received his pair share from the oil revenue as it specifically spelled out in the peace agreement. Mr. Mayardit was not a lone, though, many GOSS officials, including Deng Alor, spoke publicly about the same issue, questioning the Omer El-Bashir’s sincerity of maintaining just peace in the country.

President Kirr Mayardit needs to know one thing, and I hope he does, the CPA is perceived by President Bashir as a real threat to his regime. He knows allowing people of the South to decide their destiny in 2011 mean self-independent; and if this be come a reality Mr. Bashir knows that the outcome will not be what he hopes to happen. He understands the independent South Sudan will more likely cost him much of its oil and other mineral wealth. So, what is trying to do now is to buy time and undercut implementation slowly by using other forces in the South Sudan, through bribery, and through the tactics of dividing rule. He would love to see fighting between southern groups continue indefinitely, and hope the referendum would be postponed. The only way to diminish these tactics is for President Kirr to tell the truth to the world and urge the world to keep the pressure on, by imposing tough measures such as economic sanction. President Kirr should convey two messages to President George W. Bush when he comes to Washington next week: impose tough sanction on Sudan Government and exempt the South Sudan from the economic Sanction. We shouldn’t be worried too much so long the international community is willing to exempt the South Sudan from sanction.

* Tugul Nyak Diew is a PhD student in organizational behavior and management at Capella University. He can be reached at [email protected]