Kenya bans critical study on Igad role in Sudan peace process
January 27, 2008 (PARIS) — The Kenyan government banned a critical study on the IGAD mediation of Naivasha peace talks between the Sudanese government and the former rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, Sudan Tribune has learned.
The fact is back to July 2007 when Kenya, chairman of the IGAD, objected the presentation of an evaluation of role of the regional body in Sudan’s peace process commissioned by the IGAD because it was very critical to the role of the mediation team headed by Lazaro Sumbeiywo, Kenya special envoy for peace in the Sudan talks.
The Sudanese researcher, John Young, was surprised to learn when he arrived to present his study at an IGAD meeting held in Mombasa on 9 July 2007 that Kenya took exception of his paper and threatened to cancel the conference if his paper was accepted by the IGAD secretariat.
Young criticized the fade role of the regional organization and said in his paper that the real player was the US Administration and deplored the absence of regional actors.
“The US, and not Kenya, dominated the peace process and that Kenya has for many years been widely held to be under the influence of the US and Britain, and hence represented their interests at the negotiations.” He told Sudan Tribune.
For some months after the conference, IGAD demanded that he makes a series of changes to my paper to satisfy the Kenyans. “Since there was no provision in my contract with IGAD to make any changes, I refused.” He added.
To sanction his refusal the regional body told him he would be paid for his research.
The former Special Envoy General Sumbeiywo had already refused to cooperate with the research. According to the Sudanese researcher the General Sumbeiywo was angry because he had proposed that he and his colleagues conduct their own evaluation of their own mediation.
(ST)
Below a link to the full text of the study:
Gatwech
Kenya bans critical study on Igad role in Sudan peace process
Why should Kenya be scared by the revelation of the truth when the so-called democratic countries, including Kenya, are supposed to be transparent.
Many people including myself knew before this research that Kenya and the IGAD secretariat were just compiling and presenting ideas from the US and the Britain in addition to most of the peace text they copied from the Khartoum Peace Agreement (KPA) signed in 1997 between the Sudan government and the South Sudan Independence Movement, led by Dr. Riek Machar Teny-Dhurgon.
This is where the idea of self-determination was negotiated for the first time and accepted by the present northern government. This was said to be exercised in an internationally supervised referendum and was enshrined in the 1998 Sudan National Constitution, not in 2005. It is not a result of IGAD mediation in 2005.
South Sudan to retain its own army during the interim period was also in the Khartoum Peace Agreement. Not new at all.
All those principles, be it democratic or human rights were also embodied in the Khartoum Peace Agreement. The Americans brought the Abyei protocol and handed it to John Garang who accepted it and compiled it with the rest of the documents they were referring to, etc.
The research should not scary any body. I hope people are not working to steal history or claim efforts of others. They should happily admit it.