South Sudan army denies engineering defection of top rebel commanders

August 12, 2015 (JUBA) – South Sudanese government and army dismissed reports alleging it played an instrumental role in the defection of the top rebel commanders from the leadership of the former vice president, Riek Machar, claiming the differences were purely over the manner in which Machar managed the movement.

“It is not surprising to hear because it has always been the result of a rebellion without objectives. This was expected because this is not the first time rebellion under Machar has never managed to remain intact,” said South Sudan’s defence minister Kuol Manyang Juuk, in an interview with Sudan Tribune on Wednesday.

“You know what happened when he (Riek Machar) defected from the SPLA in 1991 with Lam Akol. They never stayed together. They went and torn apart that movement. Lam went his way and took his own way,” explained minister Juuk, in response to the announced defection of a number of senior rebel commanders who claimed to have disowned their commander-in-chief, Machar.

The top defence official however explained that the division within the rebel leadership was not the work of the government but allegedly due to differences between Machar and some of the commanders.

“Reports [of] their differences have been in the news for quite sometimes and so what those of Peter Gatdet did yesterday [Tuesday] was to formalize what has been in the circulating in the media all this long about their differences with Riek,” he said.

Juuk said the reasons put in the declaration statement which denounced the rebel leader’s leadership were issues which, he said, had nothing to do with the government.

“They are purely their own issues,” he said.

Presidential advisor on decentralization and intergovernmental linkages, Tor Deng Mawien, said in a separate interview that the government was ready to negotiate with any group willing to lay down their arms and return to the country to pursue peaceful dialogue without the use of violence.

A statement purportedly signed by Major General Peter Gatdet Yakah, former rebels’ chief of general staff or operations was issued from the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, and circulated on Tuesday in the media.

General Yak, together with Major General Gathoth Gatkuoth and few others said they were no longer part and parcel of the movement under the leadership of Machar. They also called for exclusion of president Salva Kiir and Machar in a transitional government of national unity.

(ST)