NCP says SPLM might want to evade Sudan’s election
May 23, 2009 (KHARTOUM) — The dominant National Congress Party (NCP) said allegations of forging the population census by Sudan People’s Liberation Movement could mean that the SPLM want to evade the upcoming elections.
The SPLM officials accused the NCP of manipulating the census results particularly the number of southerners in the north. Yasir Arman the deputy Secretary general said the number of SPLM members in Khartoum is at least two million while the results of the counting gives only 350 thousand.
“The population census is a professional and technical process and any skepticism should be made in this regard but if it is political suspicion it would be totally wrong, said NCP election committee chairman Ibrahim Gandour in a statement released on Friday.
Gandour further said that the census was supervised by sub-committees of the National Census Commission comprising representatives of northern and southern Sudan and monitored by technical committees consisting of 65 people, including 25 representing various southern states, representatives from political forces and civil society organizations.
He added that the Monitoring and Observation Committee included international observers and representatives from Norwegian, French, British and US aid agencies and UN, as well as neighboring countries such as Egypt, Kenya and Uganda in addition to Indonesia, India and South Africa.
“There could be no doubt in the credibility of these countries,” he stressed.
The NCP official added that skepticism in the census was meant just to spark a political dust and also could have been meant to evade the upcoming elections.
The delimitation of electoral constituencies will be based on the census figures for the general elections that are expected to be held in February 2010.
Southern Sudanese officials say they account for one third of the total population.
The First Vice President and President of southern Sudan semi-autonomous government, Salva Kiir Mayadrit approved the results during a meeting of the Sudanese presidency but twelve days later on May 18 he said “unsatisfied with the census results.”
(ST)