Too late for Taha’s envy
By Justin Ambago Ramba
February 13, 2010 — The South would be leaping into darkness should it choose to seceded, said Ali Osman Taha, the Sudanese Vice President and Secretary General of the dominant National Congress Party (NCP) of president Omer al Bashir while on a visit this to Egypt.
Is it to be believed that Ali Osman Taha is really concerned about what would happen to an independent south Sudan, if he spent two decades showering it with bombs and all kinds of lethal warfare? Yes of course Ali is worried, and rightly so but not because he loves the south.
Ali and his other Arab colleagues are scared to death should the south secede, and his statement is nothing but the projection of the fears experienced among the northerners and their parasitic politicians who only survive by exploiting the services and natural resources of the south and it is the likes of Ali himself who will be left in darkness when the south is finally gone.
Ali’s statement is a reflection of a deeply seated disappointment that the CPA that he signed with late Dr. John Garang de Mabior, though primarily worded to consolidate the unity of the Sudan, the realities that accompanied the bumpy implementation have left no any room for the congenitally anomalous unity.
The real reply to Ali’s statement can only come about after we have finally seceded and succeeded to build prosperous south Sudan, and all southern nationalists should take this as a challenge and prove to the north that we are rather jumping into a calculated bright future as expressed by one elder in a later paragraph.
Even before Taha, some people have already expressed their concerns and the most recent was when the UN Secretary General called for the maintenance of Sudan’s sovereignty by making the unity attractive. Muamar Al Ghadafi did make a similar comment.
While there are even times when top south Sudanese politicians were concerned about the future of an independent south Sudan, some have maintained that all the insecurities that have recently engulfed the region to be the work of what they call the enemies of peace.
At other occasions it is said to be the work of the north in order to show a bad image of the south and reflect negatively on southerners’ ability to rule themselves should they opt for independence.
There seems to be a huge propaganda going around that south Sudan needs to be protected from itself, otherwise it could easily break into another Somalia. This may look a remote possibility to most of us, but if we recognize that Somalization itself happens in stages and over some period of time, in which the government structures starts to breakdown and the full picture comes to show when the central government finally ceases to exist, this very scenario is not far from happening in the whole Sudan with or without the South.
We are a proud people and I know that, but is this pride enough to save our homeland? Of course we love the south and that is why we refused to surrender to the northern domination, yet we are not without our own short comings.
The northern politicians who are even wanted internationally for not only to have posed dangers to the world peace and security but they have built their empire on the skulls of their own citizens (Vice President and President Al Bashir still remain as fugitives of the international judgement) think that they can find some relief in criticising the situation in the south which is mainly resulted from NIF/NCP calculated policies.
The leadership in the south have not been a good one over the last five years, and they milked and sucked the staggering southern economy to complete dryness, assisted in depleting its resources in the most careless way. We accept that our officials were not good enough as they looted the finances, starved the people, and corrupted the system.
We are now at this cross roads as whether we are really true nationalists or just agents of the parasitic globalization, and that we are being used against our own selves through our own resources? Are we actually in control or re we just toys in the hands of some huge forces somewhere who are using use to achieve their own goals?
This takes us to the next question, and it is about our friends and how do we actually relate to them. How many of them are our own choices and how many are imposed on us? Do we know what types of friendship are we involved in? Is it the one that we are free to quit should we find it unrewarding or are we hooked in some ways that we can only pray for God to save us when the friendship goes wrong? Do we interact as equals at all stages of the relationships? Are we being treated as minors and in which even our interest takes a minor position in the deals or which way does things operate? There are all questions that come along with sovereignty and we have answered them sincerely.
The way the 2011 referendum is been taken by different people is obviously motivated by their personal interests. South Sudanese are not going to make their choice from a neutral position. The Sudan until that moment of casting the votes in the referendum officially remains a united country with some sell out voices propagating to stay with the north and that by may mislead outsiders to assume that there still exists a remote chance for unity,
But however because of the fact that Sudan’s unity that has been there for the last five decades or more has never been a good one. And it is for this reason that the logical choice for the south would be to walk out of it.
Vice president Ali Osman Taha has never ever been expected to campaign for the secession of south Sudan so his pro-unity comments are not new and they wouldn’t affect the choice to be made by the people of the south. Nor are we indebted for any praises or comments from uninvited sources like the Libyan leader.
If the Sudanese Vice President was in Egypt to salvage Darfur, then he was better off sticking to that, because to everybody’s best judgement of which the Egyptian are no exceptions, south Sudan is already prepared to overwhelmingly vote for secession. Ali Osman Taha shouldn’t fool himself and nor going to fool the Egyptian government with him. But the people of south Sudan are not surprised in any way because they never ever expected to hear Arabs accepting defeat or admitting failure?
How many of our people see it the same way that this southern Sudanese elder sees it. These are his words and believe me they contain a strong message to Ali and his Arab kinsmen and I am glad to quote him here.
He said, “Dear Son of the South, I’m sure you have read the speech of Mr. Taha with regards to the South voting for independence. I take issue with his remark saying that “voting for independence will be a leap into darkness because the south has no experience in government.”
Does this man expect us to believe him and take him seriously? Who threw us in the darkness to begin with?
The consecutive Khartoum governments have managed to see to it that the south remains in darkness. Even the present government of Bashir and his cronies, of which Taha is one, has not lifted a finger to pull us out of the deep pit of darkness.
For the last fifty years we have been slowly scaling the wall of the pit towards light. With the CPA we see a tiny light at the opening of the pit. We are almost there.
Come the referendum we will be out of the darkness and into light. We have no illusion; the light will probably blind us; our eyes will take time to get used to the bright light. We will falter or even fall at times. But, with time, we will be able to see and walk steadily.”
Understandably, Taha must be kicking himself for not seeing the devil contained in CPA document. He is counting on certain unionists in the SPLM whom he trusted could put pressure on the majority secessionist south Sudanese so to favour unity. Taha was wrong and his argument that the south cannot rule itself is passé and has been used before.
What Taha fails to see is that the south is very sophisticated now, very politically savvy. It is not the south of illiterate chiefs that they bribed (even though they still use this method today). We can rule ourselves! The south has more educated human capacity (and natural resources) than Eritrea at the time of independence. Taha and his type can try to scare the southern people but I think we know what they are trying to do.
However we all continue to trust on the southern masses and it is good that the true nationalists are our people who live deep in the rural south Sudan. They have always offered the force for maintaining the anti-Arab resistance and the y physically repelled the northern domination. Even if Ali, al Bashir, Egypt, and the Arab world resort to bribe the greedy amongst our people, however our grassroots still remain intact and loyal to the slogan of total independence.
It is too late for Taha’s envious statements and instead of behaving intellectually by activating the formation of the referendum commission and set the post 2011 arrangements rolling for a peaceful political divorce, the 2nd vice president is wasting his time on bygones. The independence of the south is bound to happen even if that means pushing it through Ali’s envious eyes. Halleluiah!
Our self confidence will see us through. As long as we keep learning from our mistakes we will for sure answer Ali, and tell him that neither him nor his Egyptian counterparts going to succeed in keeping us in the dark pit any more. Our destiny is to come out into the light. His comments have just strengthened our determination to walk tall and vote for the right leaders in April 2010 and Independence, come January 2011.
Dr. Justin Ambago Ramba, M.B, B.Ch, D.R.H, M. He can be reached at either [email protected] or [email protected]. All the articles of the author are available at www.nilebuffalo.com and blog http//ussp-news.blogspot.com