Southern Sudan: Cession is inevitable

Abdelfatah Arman

December 5, 2009 — When the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) was signed on January 9th, 2005, between the government of Sudan and Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM); the Sudanese people have received this news with tears of joy, because this agreement has put an end to the longest war in Africa. More than two millions have been killed during the warfare, and many more have been displaced. In addition, more than four millions have been scatters around the world; seeking asylum in order to replant themselves in a new environment and societies, fleeing from a repressive regime came to power by a coup.

The CPA has stated clearly that the government of national unity must make unity attractive to the Southern Sudanese, which means unity as it is not attractive to the people of southern Sudan, and it should be made attractive to them before 2011 referendum when southern Sudanese will decide the fate of the Sudan. Whether they want to stay in a united Sudan or they want form a country of their own.

The government of national unity has failed to make unity attractive, instead of making it attractive to the people of southern Sudan the government has been working on the contrary which is making separation attractive. Many of you may ask how? Here is my response to that question: what so called the government of national unity has not made any efforts to rebuild Southern Sudan; it did not build a single school, hospital, sanitization facilities and roads to connect the north with southern Sudan. Some might respond to that by saying that the government of national unity does not have the capacity and resources to do so, my response to that statement would be: If the government of the national unity has the capacity and resources to build dams, airports and bridges in the north, what makes it short-handed when it comes to the issue of rebuilding the south?! If the government of the national unity has no resources to rebuild the South, they could at least call for an international or regional intervention to help in the process of rebuilding the South. Instead of doing so, the government was and still is a lame duck, and it operates like a military base “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” and now, we are being left with less than fourteen months for southern Sudan referendum.

The National Congress Party (NCP) dragging its feet when it comes to the implementation of the CPA. The border demarcation has not been done yet, the Popular Consultation for the Blue Nile and the Nuba Mountain provinces have not been achieved yet. Furthermore, the laws to transform Sudan from a dictatorship regime into a democratic one still are being debated between the NCP and SPLM. In addition, the NCP does not have a political will to implement the rest of the CPA nor working toward a united Sudan. In this case, we should not blame SPLM leadership or the Southern Sudanese in general, if Southern express their opinions on having their own country, we should blame the NCP and the rest of northern elites who have been ruling the country since its independent without having any vision on how to rule it without excluding or marginalizing any region or a group of people. All formers governments and this current regime have had a history of not bringing people together, but they are well known as trouble makers, and they have been working so hard on dividing and marginalizing people.

The NCP does not need to scapegoat anyone, but they need to sit down with their partner in SPLM to agree on how to make separation peaceful, because the separation of Southern Sudan is imminent, and nothing can stop it. What we should do now is making this process in a civilized manner. If anyone thinking of destabilizing the South through proxy war, they are wrong because if your neighbor’s house on fire that fire will get to your house, instead of pouring more oil in it you should help your neighbor to containment that fire. The same thing can be said on South-North relationship because unstable north means unstable south. In January 2011, if the South decided to leave, the north should support the southern decision and remain friends because being unfriend (a new word just being added to the American dictionary) being unrefined means there are more hostilities yet to come. The Sudanese people are fed up and they do not want to go back to war under any circumstances.

Cession means we all as Sudanese have failed to realize a united Sudan that contains and respects our differences. I personally, hope that the referendum process will be conducted in a conducive and peaceful environment, and its out come will be respected in all cases.

The author is the correspondent of Ajras Alhurriya daily newspaper in Washington. He can be reached at [email protected]