Salva Kiir pushes for census result to favor Southerners’ interest

By Manyang Mayom

February 23, 2009 (WAU) – Salva Kiir Mayardit, the president of Southern Sudan and vice president of the national government, made a speech last Tuesday in Wau seeking to prepare his constituents for a possible row over the release of the national census results.

In a radio broadcast address to a huge gathering during the inauguration of Wau’s new diesel power station, Kiir said that he suspects an unobserved agenda influencing the delay in releasing the results of Sudan’s fifth housing and population census.

According to Sudan Radio Service and a Sudan Tribune correspondent who attended the gathering, Kiir pointed to unidentified parties as instigators trying to spoil Sudan’s peace.

“We should ask ourselves why the result has not been released. Maybe there are some people who are attempting to delay the announcement of the results of the southern Sudan population census. I have said before that if the result comes out in a way which does not satisfy us, we will reject it,” he noted.

The release of the census information is among a number of delayed provisions of the landmark 2005 peace deal that ended the civil war. Other outstanding issues include border demarcation, demobilization, oil revenue sharing and elections preparations.

“The results of the population census are not yet out because they want to see the reaction of the southerners; they say if you want to provoke the southerners to commit mistakes, just give them a small pinch and they will get angry and will fight, but no, we will not respond to that and go for a fight,” said Kiir.

Pointedly, Kiir referred to the provisions in the peace agreement that permit Southern Sudan to vote for secession in 2011.

“They think that if the southern Sudan population is small, they will not go to vote in the referendum. It is not true: even if the result of the southern Sudanese population comes out as only 500 people they have the right to a referendum, the right to self-determination—they will still go to vote.”

Other southern officials have intimated that census takers omitted questions on ethnicity and religion in order to deliberately undercount up to several million southerners residing in the North, while also pointing to the enormous logistical difficulties facing the census when undertaken during a period of weeks last year.

For instance, there were heavy rains, and in Lakes State the census was not completed in some counties due to clashes at the time that resulted in burning of census materials.

(ST)