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June 16, 2015 (NAIROBI) – South Sudan's incumbent vice president, James Wani Igga, has reportedly agreed to offer both his government's executive and party positions to the rebel leader, Riek Machar, earning praises that he had been a peace lover who always bought Machar back with position.

South Sudan's vice-president, James Wani Igga (Photo: Larco Lomayat)

This came in light of the Arusha intraparty reunification dialogue involving three rival factions of the ruling Sudan Peoples' Liberation Movement (SPLM) in which Machar is reportedly reinstated as first deputy chairman of the party and also in the Addis Ababa power-sharing negotiations where he will likely become the first vice president in government.

Igga would get back to his previous pre-December 2013 position as second deputy chairman of the party and also second vice president in government per provisions of the SPLM constitution on leadership hierarchy.

The armed opposition leader was the vice president in government until June 2013 when he fell out with president Salva Kiir reportedly due to his call for internal reforms in the ruling party and in government, which earned him a dismissal decree. He was also dismissed from the position as party first chairman after the December 2013 crisis, subsequently replacing him with Igga in both government and party positions.

In the past one year of peace negotiations on power-sharing in Addis Ababa, Igga vowed not to again step down for Machar like he allegedly did in 2002 during 21 years of war with Sudan when the previously disintegrated SPLM in 1991 between Machar and late John Garang reunified its ranks and file in Nairobi, Kenya, under the leadership of its founder, late Garang.

However, sources revealed to Sudan Tribune that Igga had last week expressed willingness to let go the position for Machar on condition that the speaker of national parliament became an Equatorian.

“Vice president Wani Igga always buys back Riek Machar with his positions. He has now agreed again to let him reoccupy his two positions so that peace prevails,” the source alleged on condition of anonymity.

Also one of the SPLM former detainees officials who travelled to the South Sudanese capital, Juba, last week, for talks with the government on party reunification confirmed to The East African this week that Igga was willing to step down for Machar.

“Mr Wani has been very magnanimous and is a lover of peace. That is why he gave up the position of the SPLM second deputy chairman to Dr Machar in 2002, when the former vice-president joined the movement. He still holds that people should not continue dying because of a position,” said Cirino Hiteng.

IGGA POSITION NOT TAKEN

SPLM opposition faction led by Machar however dismissed the argument as “nonsensical” saying the rebel leader had never taken the position of James Wani Igga.

“Yes, we have been hearing these nonsensical and misleading arguments. Comrade Dr. Riek Machar has never in history taken the position of comrade James Wani and he will not do so because this will be a self-demotion,” Machar's spokesman, James Gatdet Dak, told Sudan Tribune in response to the allegations.

“How would a senior leader choose to take the lower position of his junior if the idea is to reinstate to pre-crisis positions? This does not make sense and nobody asked for it,” he said.

Dak claimed that Machar was always senior to Igga whether in historical SPLM since formation in 1983 or in government since formation in 2005, saying the first SPLM merger or reunification in 2002 was to restore the historical hierarchy of the movement in which Machar was senior as number three at the time after late John Garang and incumbent president Salva Kiir.

He further explained the circumstances which led to the power-sharing in the reunified leadership of the movement on 6 January 2002, saying the leaders were simply reinstated to their respective positions they held prior to 1991 split.

“If people referred back to 2002 leadership merger agreement, it was based on the understanding of reinstating historical party leadership to their pre-1991 positions of the political military high command. This was how late Dr. John Garang retained his position as chairman and commander-in-chief, and Salva Kiir became first vice chairman,” he further claimed.

“Dr. Riek Machar rightfully took the third position as the next in the hierarchy. This was after the first debate to merge the two SPLM factions as equals was abandoned. This first proposal was for either late Dr. Garang or Dr. Machar to chair the reunified movement and the other automatically became the first vice chairman.”

He said the debate finally boiled down to reinstating the historical leadership when Salva Kiir refused to give the second position to Riek Machar with the argument that the former was historically senior to the latter in the movement's original leadership hierarchy.

He further explained it was also agreed in the document that an election for new party top leadership would be conducted during a second national convention three months after the Nairobi merger agreement in 2002, which he said did not happen.

Dak said in the same current situation if there was to be an agreement to reinstate leadership per a peace agreement, Machar would be going back to his former position, but not taking Igga's hierarchical position.

He said it would have been the other way around if Igga took Machar's position or the position of president Kiir.

The rebel leader's spokesman further challenged that people who made such allegations that Igga gave his position to Machar were either ignorant of the terms of such agreements or consciously trying to drag Equatorians into falsely believing that their “so-called position” was always snatched by somebody.

He said Equatorians had the right to occupy any position including the party chairmanship and president, and not condemned to the position of deputy. He added that if president Kiir stepped down for Igga the rebels would have equally recognized him as “peace-partner-president of the regime in Juba until a final peace agreement says otherwise.”

The East African regional bloc, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), has proposed a power-sharing in a draft final peace agreement to end the 18-month long civil war between president Kiir and his former deputy Machar.

The agreement proposed to maintain Kiir as interim president during a 30-month long transitional period with Machar reinstated as his first vice president.IGAD is yet to announce a date for resumption of the talks in Addis Ababa where the warring parties are expected to officially present their respective responses to the proposal.

(ST)

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June 16, 2015 (KHARTOUM) - A senior official at the opposition Popular Congress Party (PCP) led by Hassan al-Turabi said that differences within the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) have presented the major obstacle to the national dialogue process.

From left to right: Leader of the Popular Congress Party (PCP) Hassan Al-Turabi, Reform Now Party (RNP) head Ghazi Salah Al-Deen Al-Attabani, National Umma Party (NUP) Al-Sadiq Al-Mahdi and second vice-president Hassabo Abdel-Rahman attend a speech by the president announcing a national dialogue initiative on 27 January 2014 (SUNA)

In an interview with Sudan Tribune, PCP external relations official Bashir Adam Rahma, said that the government and the opposition forces supporting the dialogue agreed on a roadmap including allowing freedoms, stopping the war, opening safe corridors to deliver humanitarian aid to the needy, releasing political detainees and offering the necessary guarantees for the rebel groups to take part in the national dialogue conference inside Sudan.

“However the government slowed down the implementation of the roadmap in order to hold the general elections,” Rahma further said.

He pointed that the national dialogue mechanism known as 7+7 had met after the elections and decided to call on the dialogue's executive committee to meet, adding the move is contingent upon approval by president Omer al-Bashir.

Rahama said the delay of the process from the government side was likely due to their hopes that rebel groups could join it. But he was quick to add that there are divergences within the government on how to deal with them.

“Apparently the position within the government [towards the rebels] is not unified because some [government parties] speak of crushing them militarily along the lines of the Sri lanka's experience while others say weakening rebels is enough to force them to join the process,” the PCP official said.

“It seems the view which calls for achieving decisive military victory [against the rebel] had the upper hand particularly following the recent defeat of the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), which is the most powerful rebel force, in Gouz Dango”, he added.

Nonetheless, Rahama stressed the PCP adheres to dialogue because it is the only safe option for Sudan, saying no negotiating party could achieve 100% of its demands but could arrive at a middle ground and hence achieve large parts of it.

He said they hope to see more pressure being put on the NCP to start the dialogue particularly as it held the general elections and formed the new cabinet. He pointed that it is imperative that rebel groups and opposition forces take part in the internal process.

The ruling NCP refused to participate in a pre-dialogue meeting called by the African Union mediation last March, stressing that the priority should be given to ensure the political stability. It also vowed to participate in the preparatory meeting after the elections.

The PCP also rejected the invitation to take part in the meeting based on their position that the national dialogue process should take place inside the country and without any external intervention.

Rahama said that the NCP represents the main obstacle to the dialogue process.
The opposition official believes that the formation of the cabinet and appointment of the speakers of the parliament and the States Council reflects internal division within the ruling party.

“We fear that some of those who have been excluded [from the cabinet posts] could obstruct the dialogue,” he added.

“I call them [those who have been excluded] the “deep state” because they ruled the country for 25 years and they have supporters within the army, security and business and economic society and they could easily obstruct the dialogue and stir up the streets,” the PCP official said.

Rahama said it is impossible to exclude a group of people who have been ruling the country for long years just by a “stroke of a pen”, calling for reassuring them for the benefit of the country.

He urged the NCP to unify its internal ranks particularly as many people think that the ruling party became nothing but president Bashir.

“He [Bashir] appointed the “yes men” in the NCP posts, National Assembly and States Council and this makes other groups within the ruling party particularly the Islamists see the work they made since the coup d'état [of June 1989] is now being controlled by a single person [Bashir] ,” he added

Earlier this month, the NCP delayed twice the announcement of the Sudanese cabinet last following differences over the composition of the government and the appointment of the speakers of the lower and upper houses.

Rahma expected that political parties which withdrew from the national dialogue including the Reform Now Movement (RNM) and the Just Peace Forum (JPF) would return to the process again, noting that leaders of those parties signalled readiness to join the dialogue particularly as there are no other options available.

He said the government, from its side, is required to allow freedoms and stop crackdown on media and confiscation of newspapers besides stopping detentions, demanding it to declare a cease-fire in order to allow passage of humanitarian assistance and hence gaining confidence of the opponents and the international community.

The PCP official also called on the 7+7 committee to intensify its work with the political parties which refused to join the dialogue besides the Western nations and the United States taking into consideration the latter's support for the national dialogue and their large influence on rebel groups.

Bashir launched the national dialogue initiative more than a year and a half ago in which he urged opposition parties and rebels alike to join the dialogue table to discuss all the pressing issues.

But the initiative faced serious setbacks after the government refusal to create suitable atmosphere by releasing political prisoners, ensuring freedoms, and postponement of elections.

The rebel groups and the opposition alliance of the National Consensus Forces (NCF) refused to join the process from the beginning while the National Umma Party (NUP) led by al-Sadiq al-Mahdi withdrew from the process in protest of al-Mahdi's arrest in May 2014.

Later on, several political parties including the RNM, JPF the Alliance of the Peoples' Working Forces (APWF) announced they had decided to suspend participation in the national dialogue until the requirements of a conducive environment are met.

The PCP was among the first political forces to approve Bashir's call for the national dialogue. Also, the lslamist party is the only significant political force that didn't suspend its participation in the process.

(ST)

June 16, 2015 (JUBA) – South Sudan has accused neighbouring Sudanese government of carrying out air attacks inside South Sudan at a border area in the oil-rich Upper Nile state on Tuesday.

A SPLA soldier looks at warplanes as he lies on the ground to take cover beside a road during an air strike by the Sudanese air force in Rubkona near Bentiu April 23, 2012 (Photo Reuters/ Goran Tomasevic)

Upper Nile state officials said warplanes sighted as coming from neighbouring Sudan entered its airspace twice on Sunday and Monday this week in Maban county area, dropping bombs and injuring at least four children, including a woman.

The air attack, according to Upper Nile state minister of information and communications, Peter Hoth Tuach, took place on Sunday in Khor Tumbak, an area at the border with Sudan in Maban county, saying this was a clear “violation” of international law.

“Sudanese warplanes, Antonov, dropped two bombs on Sunday and again on Monday in Khor Tumbak area in Maban county, wounding four children including a woman,” Tuach told Sudan Tribune on Tuesday.

“This is not the first time the Sudanese warplanes have dropped the bombs in the same area. They have done that before, destroying schools and local health centre,” he said.

Maban county commissioner John Ivo also told Sudan Tribune that the area witnessed two warplanes flying over again on Tuesday and dropped more bombs, calling it “a barbaric act in violation of the international norms and practices.”

South Sudanese army spokesperson Colonel Philip Aguer in a statement to the state owned South Sudan television on Monday accused Sudanese army of violating international law by repeatedly entering the airspace of another independent country without permission.

Aguer said the army was capable of defending the country against foreign aggression but added that the military leadership and its general command remained committed to respecting political process and bilateral agreement as a way to addressing security concerns at the common border with neighbouring country.

It remained unclear why this particular area in the border state has continued to be targeted by the Sudanese military.

Maban, which hosts over 130,000 Sudanese refugees, was bombed several times in 2014 by the Sudanese army, as Khartoum accuses the south Sudanese army of supporting the rebel Sudan people's Liberation Movement- North (SPLM-N).

The Sudanese army recently intensified attacks on the positions of the rebel SPLM-N, which controls some areas near the Upper Nile state.

Sudan and South Sudan have been trading accusations about the activities of their respective rebel groups at the border.

Last April, Sudanese government troops ambushed in a remote area in South Darfur near the border western the fighters of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) who reportedly crossed from the South Sudan Western Bahr el-Ghazal.

(ST)

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