S. Sudan’s Machar says Abyei not a shared area
September 22, 2010 (JUBA) – “Abyei area belongs to the nine Ngok Dinka chiefdoms and not a shared region with anybody else”, remarked the Vice President of the semi-autonomous southern Sudan, Dr. Riek Machar Teny at a meeting on Tuesday, September 21, 2010.
During the meeting on Tuesday with a delegation of diplomats from various foreign embassies in Khartoum which came to Juba to seek the views of the leadership in the south, the Vice President, who spearheaded the Hague’s Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) ruling that defined the boundaries of Dinka Ngok land, rejected the proposal, saying the NCP’s new position was a “discouraging” attempt to take the two parties back to square one.
Abyei, on the border between north and south Sudan is oil rich and the matter of heated debate with regards to the referendum.
Southern Sudanese are scheduled to vote in January 2011 on the independence of the semi-autonomous region. Many issues, including border demarcations are yet to be resolved.
The proposal included sharing Abyei’s political power and administration between Dinka Ngok and Messirya communities and splitting its oil revenue thus: 40% for southern Sudan and 40% for northern Sudan, with the remaining 20% shared between Dinka Ngok and Messeriya.
GoSS Vice President, Dr. Riek Machar
“Abyei belongs to Dinka Ngok, and not a shared area,” he said, explaining that despite the fact that the 2005 peace deal has provided for ‘other Sudanese residents in Abyei’ to vote in the referendum on either joining the South or remaining with the North, criteria on who should be eligible to vote in the Abyei referendum, among the other Sudanese residents, has not yet been agreed by the two parties.
The parties have also not agreed on the formation of the Abyei referendum commission, a body that would be responsible for the conduct of the plebiscite. Machar said that setting the criteria for eligibility would help ease the formation process of the commission. He appealed to the international community to assist in the matter.
He said if the NCP had the same political will as the SPLM, the issues would have been resolved.
Machar also told the diplomats that the current discussions on post-referendum arrangements between the two parties have been very slow, as they were intermittent, with long breaks and short discussion periods.
On the Southern Sudan referendum, he reiterated that it had to be conducted on January 9, 2011 whether or not the borders were demarcated or the post-referendum issues were agreed upon. “The referendum should not be tied to the borders or the post-referendum issues,” he said.
Machar reminded the delegation that Sudan “did not demarcate all its borders with its neighbors, such as Egypt and Ethiopia, when it became independent in January 1956.”
He was critical of voices from the north “who sometimes try to create unnecessary tensions over issues people can discuss during and even after the referendum. Let them not raise temperatures.”
Machar told the diplomats that only critical issues such as citizenship and the roles of the future of Joint Integrated Units (JIUs), the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army, Sudan Armed Forces, the national police and civil servants need to be resolved before the referendum. As there are southerners and northerners working in these groups in both regions, there will be conflicts of interest.
Issues such as oil, international agreements, assets and debts, if they cannot be agreed upon within the next three months, can be discussed after the referendum, explained Machar. He feared that some of these issues “may drag on for the next ten years.”
He appealed to the international community through the representatives present to double their efforts in supporting the processes of the referendum.
Asked when the SPLM would officially declare its support for either unity or secession, Machar said the party’s Liberation Council would convene in a meeting during October to evaluate its position and decide on the way forward.
“We [SPLM] are hearing voices in streets from the youth and civil society organizations, calling for separation,” he said. The party’s first deputy chairperson said the northern and southern sectors of the SPLM would debate on the issue and try to come out with a position.
In the upcoming Liberation Council meeting Machar felt the members should ask, “are we failing, or have we succeeded in changing Sudan? Are we out of touch?”
(ST)