Sudan, southern rebels agree new currency

KHARTOUM, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Sudan has agreed to introduce a new currency to reflect unity in the country after a deal is signed to end more than two decades of civil war in the south, a senior finance ministry official said on Wednesday.

The official said the southern rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), who will take a share in central government and the lion’s share of the southern government under the deal due to be finalised by the end of the year, had agreed to the new currency and details would be worked out jointly after the signing of an agreement.

“There will be a new currency for sure … to show unity after signing the peace agreement,” the official told Reuters. He said the change would cost about $80 million to $90 million.”

The costs will be included in next year’s budget, which has been drafted and is due to be presented to the council of ministers on Wednesday, he added.

Under a peace deal, revenues from Sudan’s fledgling oil industry, which currently produces around 320,000 barrels a day, will be split roughly equally between the north and the south. But the north will have an Islamic banking system separate from that of the south, which is mainly Christian and animist.

Although a definite timetable had not been set, as soon as the peace deal is signed the two sides will sit down to thrash out details as a matter of priority, said the official, who asked not to be named.

The new currency will replace the Sudanese dinar, which is divided into 10 pounds. The new currency has no name yet and it’s too early to say what the exchange rate will be. The current rate is 258 dinars to the dollar.

The southern civil war broadly pits the central Islamist government against the south, complicated by issues of oil, ethnicity and ideology. It has claimed more than two million lives, mostly from hunger and disease, and forced more than four million from their homes.