Sudanese presidency urged to resolve Abyei teachers strike as priority

By Ngor Arol Garang

August 16, 2009 (KHARTOUM) — The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) office in Abyei area has on Sunday called on the presidency to urgently resolve a week long teachers strike in the region for nonpayment of their nine months salaries.

Speaking from Abyei Chol Deng, a SPLM secretary for information and youth affairs said the presidency needs to urgently intervene in the matter of unpaid salaries of teachers in the Area since November 2008.

The entire Abyei calls on First Vice President and President of the Government of South Sudan General Salva Kiir Mayardit to quickly bring this matter to the attention of the President Omer Al-Bashir, he added.

He further said that employees of the administration including teachers have been going on rendering the much needed services to Abyei people without salaries for months and that their repeated demands for payments hardly get to the presidency attentions till teachers whose decision is supported by the population went on strike on Monday 10.

Deng said the inattention to their long time plight forced them last Monday to declare a strike, leaving hundreds of primary school pupils and secondary students stranded.

“As a citizen and not as SPLM official, I sincerely without being biased blame the presidency, this is because of the fact that it is the presidency which has the overall responsibility for the Abyei Area under the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement and the Abyei Protocol contained in the Agreement,” he argued.

Last Thursday Abyei Area Chief Administrator, Arop Moyak and his deputy Rahma Abdel-Raman discussed the need to expedite transfer of Abyei budget with the finance minister Awad Al-Jaz. A follow-up committee was formed to tackle urgently the issue.

Deng said the strike would encourage the encouraged the Abyei Administration to continue exerting all efforts in order to resolve the problem.

After four year of dispute over Abyei border, the arbitration tribunal in The Hague on July 22 settled the conflict and said the Abyei Boundary Commission Experts had exceeded their mandate when they had included Heglig and Bamboo oilfields in the territory of the nine Dinka Ngok chiefdoms transferred to Kordofan in 1905. The court annexed the oil rich area to southern Kordofan state.

The two signatories of the 2005 peace agreement endorsed the decision and the Sudanese presidency confirmed the interim administration which was formed after a roadmap reached in June 2008.

(ST)