SPLM reveals new rift with govt at Southern Sudan peace talks

NAIROBI, Nov 27, 2004 (Al-Ayyam) — The chairman of the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) delegation to Naivasha talks, Nhial Deng Nhial, yesterday disclosed a new rift between the SPLM and the government delegation.

IGAD representative Lazaro Sumbeiywo (c) watches the exchange of documents between GoS representative Yaya Hussein Babikar (l) and SPLA Nhial Deng Nhial (r) during a special session of the Security Council focused on Sudan in Nairobi, Friday, Nov 19, 2004. (AFP).

The difference is centred on the government’s insistence that the Central Bank should receive the oil revenues in foreign currency, which in turn, will remit the share allocated to the southern regional government in local Sudanese currency – a matter opposed by the SPLM, demanding to get its oil returns in hard currency.

Nhial said the agreement on wealth-sharing had clearly stated that the oil returns is a southern government’s right, and that it would be remitted to it directly without any intermediary, and in hard currency in which the trade was conducted.

He also mentioned the SPLA’s insistence that its forces should be funded through the public treasury — similar to the armed forces — because the agreements with the government states the existence of two types of army as the national force.

Concluding his speech, Mr Denk said, whatever the case, the two negotiating sides were determined to reach an agreement before the year ends — as they had promised the Security Council.