Sudan VP Taha casts doubts over Abyei referendum, says South’s secession ‘against history’
October 4, 2010 (KHARTOUM) – The Sudanese 2nd Vice president Ali Osman Taha today warned that the referendum in the oil producing region of Abyei will not take place unless pending issues are resolved between the ruling National Congress Party and the Sudan People Liberation Movement (SPLM) which controls the South.
Abyei, which lies on the North-South borders, is entitled to a referendum in early 2011 as stipulated by the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) signed in 2005 between the NCP and the SPLM. The voters in that region will decide whether they want to be part of the north or a possible new country in the south.
From the start, the status of Abyei has been a contentious issue after the NCP rejected the report by the Abyei Boundaries Commission (ABC) established in accordance with the CPA.
Both sides eventually agreed to refer the case to the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) based in The Hague to determine whether ABC exceeded its mandate which was to delimit the area of the Nine Ngok Chiefdoms transferred to the administration of Kordofan province in 1905.
The PCA ceded key oilfields to North Sudan but gave the South most of the land including Abyei town which has huge areas of fertile land and one significant oilfield.
The SPLM in control of the South has interpreted the ruling as meaning that the cattle-herding Misseriya tribe have no right to vote in areas assigned by the PCA to the Dinka Ngok.
However, the Misseriya vowed not to allow the vote to take place even if they have to resort to force unless they are allowed to participate.
Ethiopia is currently hosting NCP and SPLM delegations who are seeking to break the deadlock and reach an agreement to clear the way for the formation of the Abyei referendum commission and commencing the border demarcation on the ground to comply with the PCA ruling. The technical border committee has been unable to carry out its mandate because of threats from the Misseriya tribe.
VP Taha appeared to downplay the possibility of securing a deal during the talks in Addis Ababa sponsored by the U.S.
“If there is no agreement there will be no room for a referendum in Abyei. The challenge is to reach an agreement that will allow the referendum to take place as scheduled,” Taha told a news conference in Khartoum on Monday.
The Sudanese official further stressed that the referendum will only go ahead after acceptance of both the Misseriya and the Dinka Ngok tribes. He also suggested that the NCP will reject a U.S. proposal being discussed in Addis Ababa saying it contradicts the Abyei protocol in the CPA.
Abyei’s chief administrator Deng Arop Kuol, a member of the SPLM told Reuters he did not want to comment on Taha’s comment in detail.
“But while there are talks ongoing, the vice president should have withheld this statement,” Kuol said.
U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said the Addis Ababa talks would last for several days and that the discussions were both direct and intense.
“We’re satisfied that they’ve come prepared to engage. These are, I understand, very direct and spirited discussions under way and we hope that through these discussions in the coming days we can reach an agreement that allows the referendum in Abyei to go forward,” Crowley told a news briefing.
He declined to give an explicit reaction to Taha’s warning that the Abyei referendum could not take place if no agreement was reached.
Some analysts fear that Abyei could become “Africa’s Kashmir,” a reference to a disputed territory that Pakistan and India have fought two wars over.
In contrast to his statements on Abyei, Taha said that a separate referendum for the entire of South Sudan can be conducted despite logistical and political challenges but emphasized they must be credible and transparent to be recognized by the NCP.
Voter lists were supposed to have already been finalized by this time according to the 2005 peace agreement. The South Sudan referendum commission announced that registration will begin in mid-November leaving the commission just six weeks to register voters and finalize the lists.
The commission chairman Mohammed Ibrahim Khalil said that they have just started recruiting the more than 10,000 referendum workers needed to man the 3,600 polling centers. Khalil said that 2,000 of the polling centers will be in the south and 1,600 in the north and abroad.
The commission’s budget is still not finalized and only a few international observers are in place for the referendum.
The Sudanese Vice president underscored the need to tackle post-referendum arrangements with the SPLM or else “it would be open the door for recurrence of conflict”.
He said that the government in its desire to avoid war, calls on the SPLM and international community to help speed up demarcation of North-South borders and resolve other outstanding items such as national debt, citizenship and wealth sharing.
Furthermore, Taha said that the likely option of the South’s secession will not be an obstacle to regain unity later and strengthen ties between the two states. He described the separation of the South as “swimming against the current of history and does not serve the interests of the South and politically unjustified”.
He refused to direct criticism at SPLM chairman Salva Kiir for declaring his intention this week to vote for separation saying he was doing so as a South Sudan citizen not in his capacity as South Sudan president else he would have to be held “politically accountable”.
But the NCP deputy chairman accused some circles at the SPLM who seek to turn the South into “personal property”.
Analysts have warned there is a risk that conflict could reignite if the referendum — highly prized by southerners who are expected to vote for secession — is disrupted or delayed.
(ST)