NCP, SPLM officials exchange blame over inevitable separation of the South

January 10, 2010 (JUBA) – Senior officials of the Sudan’s ruling parties in both North and South marked the 5th anniversary of the 2005 peace deal with accusations and counter-accusations over failure to make unity attractive as the people of Southern Sudan are left with only twelve months to possibly vote for independence.

Officials of the National Congress Party (NCP) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) on Friday, 9th January, exchanged blame over what they saw as “inevitable” independence of the South in January 2011 referendum because the other party did not do enough to convince Southern Sudanese to vote for the unity of the country.

The Southern Sudan referendum law was passed two weeks ago, paving the way for the conduct a referendum by the people of Southern Sudan to either choose to create an independent country in the South or confirm the current unity of the Sudan.

Addressing a political rally on Friday in the Blue Nile state’s capital, Damazin, the SPLM deputy chairman and Governor of the state, Malik Agar, accused the NCP of failure to make the unity of Sudan an attractive option for southerners.

He said the current situation shows signs of separation between North and South, and also warned that secession of the South would lead to war if issues like border demarcation and oil were not resolved.

The SPLM deputy chairman further expressed fear of insecurity in Abyei and Nuba Mountains if the South separates.

To remedy the situation, Malik said the only path for unity is to apply confederation between North and South and better structures of decentralization.

“We still have an opportunity to make the unity attractive for the southerners if we abandon assimilation ideology,” he said.

However in a rare admission of the inevitability of the South becoming an independent country, the NCP has recently appeared to have given up on optimism to keep the country united and resigned to the pro-independence wind in South Sudan.

Al-Dardiri Mohamed Ahmed, a leading figure at the NCP, was quoted as saying that the separation of the south from the north became the “reality and inevitable” blaming the Sudan People Liberation Movement (SPLM) for this outcome.

“We should be realistic and talk about what is current and what should be. We in the NCP were keener than anyone else on unity, but the SPLM blocked that option for us, and we missed the opportunity” he said.

He pointed out that the two parties should instead concentrate in building on positive future relations between the two would be countries, adding that North and South should have “brotherly relations” in the post-independence scenario.

On the same day, the SPLM Deputy Secretary General for Southern Sector, Dr. Ann Itto, instead blamed the NCP for failure to make unity attractive.

Dr. Itto said the time to talk about making unity attractive has already expired and become meaningless, adding that what the party is looking towards to is the conduct of referendum in which the people of Southern Sudan will decide by themselves what they want.

Dr. Itto also slammed the recently released report by a number of Oxfam-led Non-Governmental Organizations on the situation in Southern Sudan.

The report prompted or coincided with the American administration’s expession of concern made in the person of the Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who spoke about the general situation in Sudan and the insecurity and need for responsible governance in the South.

“In Southern Sudan, no matter the outcome of the referendum, Southern Sudan must increase its institutional capacity and prepare to govern responsibly, whether as a semiautonomous region within Sudan or a newly independent nation,” Clinton said.

Dr. Itto however told a group of journalists in Juba on Friday that the report, despite having some accurate issues, is largely inaccurate because it has painted Southern Sudan as “doomed and gloomy.”

She argued that the region has not failed and was trying its best to improve on good governance and security.

Earlier, the Kenyan midwife of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), General Lazarus Simboyo, in an interview with the BBC on Friday on secession of the South said he did not mediate the peace deal between NCP and SPLM with the intention of dividing Sudan, but admitted that the separation of the South from the North looked “inevitable.”

He called on the international community to redouble its effort in assisting the two parties in the process of referendum exercise and to resolve the remaining issues, particularly to quickly demarcate the North-South border in the count down to referendum in January 2011.

(ST)