Dilemmas of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement
By James Okuk
June 3, 2007 — The de facto and de jure status of the Government of the Republic of the Sudan (GOS) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A); the two parties who decided to give birth to CPA, has become obsolete. GOS has transformed itself into a different image with its current levels (of Government of National Unity, Government of Southern Sudan, Government of States, and Local Government), which are comprised of multi-party percentage representations. It is not still synonymous to National Congress Party (NCP) government with its previous cronies from other parties. Also SPLM/A has transforming itself into a political party (SPLM) and an independent standing army (SPLA). It is no more a pseudo-government (with legislature, executive and judiciary arms) as it used to be in the liberated areas before the CPA. Nevertheless, NCP is the majority in GoNU and States of Northern Sudan. It also controls Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) with its headquarter in Khartoum city. On the other side, SPLM is the majority in GoSS and States of Southern Sudan. It also controls SPLA with its headquarters in Juba Town. The motives behind these separate controls could be deterrent from any possible worse political deviation by any of the partners or any of the opposing political parties. Other represented supporting political parties in the government are only a minority or a disguised of the two partners.
1. The Changed Status:
Based on the above scenario, a reflective person is forced to ask these questions: Will NCP and SPLM (with their separate armies) still be the South-North government majority partners after the mid-term general elections in 2009? How will they organize jointly the referendum for Self-determination of the People of Southern Sudan and Abyei Area in 2001 (CPA, Ch.I, 2.5, Ch.IV, 1.1.1) when their statuses had changed from governments to political parties? Will they still do it as political parties’ partners if they happened to be voted out of the government by the people? For me, this is a dangerous dilemma in Sudanese government and party politics. It needs to be resolved clearly by the two partners in consultation with other major political parties in the country so that the people get assured of the desired outcome of the CPA without rush hour crisis.
2. South-North and African-Arab Paradigms:
Another dilemma is that CPA was aimed to resolve maximally the problem of the People of Southern Sudan, and minimally the problem of the black people of Southern Kordoan (Nuba), Blue Nile (Funj) and Western Kordofan (Dinka Ngok of Abyei) Northern States. Those people struggled seriously side by side with Southerners in SPLM/A in its wish to liberate the whole Sudan. When that wish was impaired by Naser Declaration and the split of SPLM/A, then the paradigm of the New Sudan came up strongly. Because that paradigm was vague and based on military victory and liberation, those Northern comrades thought it will continue to address their grievances. Less have they thought that the New Sudan could mean Southern Sudan liberated from the North by political negotiations and compromise as it had happened in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).
But, though CPA was meant to solve the problem of the South in reference to the North, yet it has been controlled by the two partners (SPLM/A & NCP/SAF) who are totally different in their power visions. NCP is a Pro-Islamic North and Anti-Christianizing South because it is controlled by Islamists Arab Northerners who see themselves as superior Sudanese. SPLM is both a disguised Pro-South and Pro-Secular North because it is controlled by African Southerners with influence of some communist Arab Northerners. Both of them are not faithful boyfriend partners to the lady North-South paradigm who gave them the child CPA. Though they have defined Southern and Northern Sudan geo-politically (Interim Constitution of Southern Sudan, 2005, Ch.I, 1), they have not done it demo-politically. That is, they have identified the land territory and the type of government but they have not constitutionally defined the people who inhabit that land. They have not bothered to define who is a Southern Sudanese as well as who is a Northern Sudanese: Is the Northerner or the Southerner defined by the 1) residential status where everybody who has settled legally for a long time (ten years and above) in either Northern or Southern Sudan becomes identified with it? Is it defined by 2) ethnic status where someone is identified by the location of the tribe he belongs to even if he/she does not live within that location? For example, if my tribe is Collo(Shilluk) whose original land falls within the vicinity of Southern Sudan borders of 1/1/1956, I should belong there even if I am settled officially elsewhere (in Khartoum or Washington). Also if my tribe is Jahali whose root settlement falls within Northern territory, then I should belong there even if I was born and lived in Malakal in Southern Sudan. Or is it defined by 3) racial status where a black African Sudanese is seen as a Southerner and a Brown Arab Sudanese is seen as a Northerner? For example, a black Nuba or a Funj person is seen as a Southerner by most of Southerners and Northerners; likewise, they see the brown Afro-Arabs only as Northerners. This definitional and identification negligence has put Ngok Dinka of Abyei Area, the black African races who fall within the Northern border of the British colonialists of 1/1/1956, and the Malakias (Afro-Arabs) group who mostly live in Malakal Town into a pathetic political situation within the agreed North-South and Arab-African paradigms in the CPA.
Abyei Area (with its residents: Ngok Dinka, Misseriya, other Arab nomadic peoples, etc) is only defined by CPA as a bridge between the people of the Northern and Southern Sudan, pending the result of the referendum for self-determination. Its residents neither belong to any of these territories fully. They can be seen as unreliable for reflecting the interests of the North or South specifically in any decision-making position given them in GoNU or GoSS. The Southerners may sympathize with Abyei Dinka on ethnic basis but not residentially because they are not alone in that area. Other Abyei residents are going to determine its fate as well during the simultaneous referendum for self-determination in 2011, so that the area becomes either part of Bahr el Ghazal or it continue to be part of Northern Sudan (CPA, Ch.IV, 1.3, a.b). Unpredictable destiny!
3. Political Parties’ Paradigm:
A further dilemma is that, what will be the paradigms for the mid-term general elections in 2009? Shall it be South-North & African/Arab or Political Parties’ democratic competition for government power? Should the political parties be forced to adopt the CPA’s South-North & African/Arab paradigms (particularly Ch.II, 2.3.5 & 2.3.7) conditioning the structure of the presidency and president of GoSS? Regarding this paradigms, how would the Southerners feel if, for example, H.E. Salva Kiir rise up in a morning with a decree that he is replacing the Foreign Minister (H.E. Dr. Lam Akol) who is a SPLM Southerner with a SPLM Northerner (H.E. Dr. Monsour Khalid)? Or replacing the Vice President of GoSS who is a SPLM Southerner with a prominent politician who is a SPLM Northerner? Or Replacing the SPLM Secretary-General who is a Southerner with a Ngok Dinka person from Abyei who is a SPLM but not yet identified as a Southerner or a Northerner? I can foresee that the Southerners will immediately criticize H.E. Salva of selling the rights of Southerners in the CPA’s lion share, though they know those Northerners have been struggling together with Southerners in SPLM/A for decades. This dilemma is generated because CPA is not based on Political Parties’ identification but rather on regional and racial categorization.
4. Politicization of SAF and SPLA:
Another dilemma is that whose force should the SAF and the SPLA be during the interim period of the CPA? Should SAF be controlled by NCP rather than by GoNU? Should SPLA be the monopoly of SPLM rather than of GoSS? If it happened that NCP or SPLM lost elections shall the Non-NCP/SPLM elected president of the Sudan or elected president of the GoSS be the C-in-C of (SAF) and C-in-C of SPLA respectively? Should these two standing armies be identified with NCP and SPLM political parties? According to ideals of democracy, a country army should always be nationalized and never politicized for the sake of protecting the sovereignty of the Republic.
5. Management of Referendum for Self-determination:
The final dilemma is the arrangement for the right of self-determination of the people of Southern Sudan and Abyei area by the two signatory parties by the end of interim period. Does the attractive politics used by the two partners to make unity of the Sudan attractive (for the people of Southern Sudan) implies making secession unattractive before these people determine their independence fate? Who shall be the GOS by then when it had been transformed into a different shape? Shall it be the NCP? Who shall be the SPLM/A when it had become separated into SPLM as a political party and SPLA as a military army? Shall it be SPLM or SPLA? Shall SPLA change its name to fit within the context of GoSS? For example, Southern Sudan People’s Army (SSPA). What will be the role of the elected government by then on the agreed plebiscite if they happened to be Non-NCP/SPLM parties?
All the questioned asked in this article puts a critical concerned Sudanese citizen into political dilemmas. But For me, the way forward is to keep the two signatory partners in power until they have facilitated the last implementation of CPA. They ought to excel in the art of managing power interests according to the gain-loss balances. This is the lesser evil that can be borne because NCP/APLM could be accountable to each other and to the people of the Sudan, on behalf of whom they negotiated the CPA.
* The author is a new junior Sudanese diplomat (Second Secretary) in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, also a PhD student in the University of Nairobi in the area of political philosophy. He can be reached at [email protected]