Senior NCP figures quit and close offices in Western Equatoria

May 5, 2011 (YAMBIO) – A senior member of the Khartoum-based National Congress Party (NCP) spelled out his reasons for quitting and closing down NCP offices in Western Equatoria on Thursday two months before South Sudan formally becomes as sovereign nation.

Awad Seid Kisanga, a minister of parliamentary affairs, gave in his notice at a press conference in Yambio saying “today May 5th 2011 marks the official closing of NCP from the state.”

Kisanga stated that the aim of the decline of NCP from the state is because the party is like a snake in the house of South Sudan; hence, time has come to “join fellow Southerners in the new country.”

The statement added that on 12 March 2011, South Sudan-based NCP members declared in front of the leaders of NCP in Khartoum that they were leaving the NCP and moving to the South to work towards building the new independent nation of South Sudan.

“We promised time we are going to make another procedure we agreed to so that we form a new party in South Sudan not NCP,” he said.

Kisanga mentioned that “as politicians we cannot live like this because the NCP has become like a snake in the house, this has become a problem for us.”

The former NCP chairperson in the state said he appreciated the leadership of the NCP especially for the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in 2005 with the former southern rebels the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM).

After the deal the SPLM became the ruling party of South Sudan. In January the region voted to separate from the north in a referendum and will secede in July.

He also extended his appreciation to the SPLM for its part in the peace deal and to the state government for having allowed the NCP to operate in the state for the past six years without any problem.

“This is a big achievement for the state as we are marching towards July 9 for the declaration of the child to be named as the Republic of South Sudan,” he stressed.

Kisanga pointed out that the southern sector headquarters of the NCP in Juba the South Sudan capital has also closed.

He called upon all the chairpersons of the NCP in the ten counties of the state to close down NCP offices and collect all the ID cards so they could officially be handed to the NCP in July 2011 after South Sudan’s declaration of independence.

Kisanga declared that they decided as southerners that, “if there is any relationship between us and the NCP will be through the embassy through the Republic of South Sudan, the new country that time will be though the regulation guiding the all the political parties southern Sudan, the difference between us [and] the NCP will be our constitution.”

He hailed the relationships incurred in the state between the southern political parties during the last April’s general elections and the January referendum on self-determination where the political parties in the state formed a forum of political parties.

Kisanga disclosed that “the general assembly will be conducted in Juba under the auspicious of senior politician Agness Lukudu this month to decide on the constitution and name of the new party to be formed by former NCP figures in the south.”

Kisanga who is an NCP member of the state government as minister of parliamentarian affairs, plus other two members in the state assembly disclosed that “they are working as civil servants of the state not for the interest of NCP.”

Kisanga dismissed the possibility that he would no longer be able to hold office after he left the NCP.

“I as the minister of parliamentarian affairs on [an] NCP ticket [I am] working according to the constitution of the state and South Sudan not NCP, and the members in the assembly are guided by the code of business and resolution of the state assembly.”

He called for a multi-party system government in the new nation that every person will have the right to exercise political freedom.

One of the former NCP members who used to advise the NCP youth league, Sharfadin Marko Gowi expressed his happiness that the office was closing.

He called upon all the youth and people who had been in NCP possessing NCP ID cards to bring them back and hand them to the office.

Gowi said that “southerners had been in the NCP in a politically motivated era, and now that the new nation is due to be declared in two months’ time, therefore the NCP office is officially closed.”

“I will stay for 4-5 days and if I find that the SPLM is the party for southerners I will be with SPLM” he disclosed.

The SPLM state secretary Manasseh Doboi Agoli congratulated the NCP in Western Equatoria state (WES) for taking the decision to close their office in the state.

“We in the SPLM had clear vision right from the inception of the movement in 1983 we are longing for inclusivity of WES and South Sudan and Sudan as whole that is why the NCP really made a wise decision to close down the office and now it remains a challenge for them to either join the SPLM or any other party” he said.

He said that the SPLM is for everybody working for the interest of the people of South Sudan and the marginalized people that is why the SPLM is in the North and in the south.

The SPLM northern sector will remain as a party after the South secedes as it has a large following in Blue Nile and South Kordofan where many joined the SPLM’s fight against Khartoum. In last year’s election SPLM candidate Malik Agar became the only non-NCP governor in north Sudan.

The SPLM northern sector is currently competing against the NCP to win control over South Kordofan in elections delayed from last year.

Despite many citizens fighting with the SPLM during the civil war Blue Nile and South Kordofan will remain in the North after the South secedes on July 9.

As part of the deal Blue Nile and South Kordofan will hold popular consultations to decide whether the peace deal addressed their grievances and determine their future relationship with the central government in Khartoum.

Before the referendum that sealed the south’s independence, most senior NCP politicians and members in Western Equatoria and those in opposition parties like defected back to the SPLM to join hands for the development of the state and South Sudan.

Isaya Yoane Gangura one of the citizens of Western Equatoria welcomed the closure of the NCP office as a “big achievement”.

Gangura said that as the south has was separating from the north it was in everyone’s interest for the NCP to return to the north.

(ST)