S. Sudan gov’t hints three months wait to form unity cabinet
January 27, 2016 (JUBA) – South Sudanese government has said it may take three more months before a transitional government of national unity (TGoNU) can be formed if the parties to the August 2015 peace agreement follow a formal procedure for amending and passing a new constitution as the basis for new government.
“The constitutional process is not an event, so we don’t expect it to come out within a day and night. The constitution has not yet gone to the ministry of justice; it will come to the cabinet; then it will go to the parliament; the parliament will take its one month, and thereafter it is passed and sent to the President for assent and signature,” Lueth told reporters in Juba after Tuesday’s extraordinary council of ministers.
He said the government will however continue to render services to the people until when the constitution is ready and the transition unity government is formed with the opposition factions.
“This is the process…so maybe up to mid-March when the Transitional Government of National Unity will be established. Meanwhile, the government will continue to render its normal services to the citizens until that time when TGoNU is established,” he said.
Meanwhile, the leader of the armed opposition faction of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM-IO), Riek Machar, who is First Vice President designate, said he will not return to the capital, Juba, for formation of the government until the constitution is amended and passed by an expanded parliament.
“Once you hear that the parties have agreed on a draft of a constitution, and the draft is taken to the transitional national assembly and the assembly has passed it, the next day I will be in Juba, because if I go to Juba now, what will I do? Complain? Get restricted not to come to Kampala? Once these important procedures are done, I want to go back to Juba,” Machar said in a press conference he conducted in the Ugandan capital, Kampala, on Tuesday after meeting President Yoweri Museveni on Monday.
“I am in South Sudan. So, from South Sudan straight to Juba, I would go,” he said.
He earlier explained that a government cannot be formed without a constitution, also adding that the creation of 28 states unilaterally by President Kiir has impeded the implementation of the peace deal which the parties signed based on the existing 10 states.
The parties are expected to tell their respective sides of the story to the forthcoming African Union summit due to begin on Thursday.
(ST)