Machar calls on SPLM in Lakes state to prepare for extra-ordinary convention

July 29, 2012 (JUBA) – The ruling party in South Sudan, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), has concluded its thanksgiving campaign which began three weeks ago in Lakes state, calling on the state leadership to remain effective.

Senior members of the party were dispatched to the ten states to carry out the campaign in thanking the people for their contribution and support to the SPLM during the liberation struggle before the independence of South Sudan.

Addressing the meeting in the state’s capital, Rumbek, on Saturday, South Sudan Vice President and SPLM deputy chairperson, Riek Machar Teny, said it was high time to thank the people for their support for the struggle as well as during the difficult time of implementing the 2005 comprehensive peace agreement (CPA) with Sudan.

Machar said South Sudanese gave their sons and daughters to fight the war, fed the SPLA and nursed it during difficulties.

One of the battles he fought leading a battalion included the battle over the control of Mayom town in Unity state with the current President of Sudan Omer Hassan al-Bashir, when he was the area commander before he became President in a bloodless coup in 1989.

During the Saturday meeting in Rumbek, Machar further added that the people stood behind the SPLM-led government during the implementation of the CPA when the Khartoum government tried to “politically recruit” within South Sudan to spoil the conduct of the referendum.

In the meeting which was attended by national ministers, members of parliaments in Juba and Rumbek as well as county commissioners and the SPLM Secretariat in the state, the Vice Chairperson of the SPLM urged the party leadership from the state to prepare for the upcoming extra-ordinary convention in Juba and the state congresses.

The party leadership in the state also presented reports to the meeting on their observations in the state about the views of the grass root populations about the party.

He explained that the extraordinary convention, the of which date has not yet been set, will discuss and review the SPLM constitution, the manifesto, the internal regulations and other basic documents of the party with the aim of aligning them with the new reality of an independent state.

(ST)