Sudan: Did GoSS really need the UN expert advice to delay the 2009 election?

The Sudan’s comprehensive peace agreement is right now in its fourth year of implementation since it was signed in January 2005. But as analysts have always argued it, the agreement unfortunately started on the wrong footing. The first six months which followed the signing of the peace deal wasn’t properly utilized, especially by the SPLM/A, where many of the technical hurdles of today would have been identified and rectified. . Unfortunately when the northern peace partner the National Congress Party (NCP) of al Bashir was seriously engaged in setting its strategies on how to distribute the government portfolios and institutionalise a clear sabotage road map for derailing the whole agreement, should SPLM prove stubborn or adamantly uncooperative, the SPLM/A on the other hand were busy with internal power struggles because their late leader had all of it embodied in himself.

The six months of pre-interim period passed with still a one man show in the SPLM/A camp as far as thinking,  planning and decision making were concerned, though by that time some non functioning structures had been formed as a compromise at the Rumbek Meeting in an effort from late Garang to save the almost fragmenting SPLM/A as he came under heavy criticisms from his senior officers,  championed by his deputy, the current First Vice President of the Sudan and President of the semi-autonomous South Sudan , H.E Salva Kiir Mayardit.

Then came the month of July, Garang was sworn in but no more than three weeks he was announced dead in the tragic plane crush. This particular event shocked the whole world and much more so were the people of the Sudan in general and the southern Sudanese in particular. And while the SPLM still prides itself for having moved swiftly to contained the situation and avoid a power vacuum, yet the hierarchy of the movement no doubt left all the local and international analysts without exception to conclude that the political changes expected to be brought about through the implementation of the CPA will never proceed as initially anticipated and indeed it has come to pass.

In this particular article I would want to highlight the lack of taking into account the conditions on the ground when the negotiators were actually setting down the time limits for the implementation of the CPA.

Due to the euphoria of the declared peace , everybody immediately forgot the fact that south Sudan has been landlocked for over two decades during which it experienced one of Africa’s deadliest wars, and that it has become the poorest region on earth with no buildings, no bridges, no roads, no hospitals, no any means of communication, no technical know how this is as far as the basic infrastructure is concerned, but more seriously and quite detrimental is the negative psychological impact of the brutal war on the population both young and old. The people no long have the ambitions, no motivations, no nationalism, no patriotism, and no orientation to the extended that some whole tribes have lost the sense of belonging to their previous home villages or towns and are now roaming the region like the cursed descendants of the biblical “CAIN”. All the noble values which used to exist among the people of south Sudan have now been replaced by individualism, nepotism, tribalism, Chauvinistic attitudes and rampant corruption.

It was only when SPLM/A took up practical power in Juba that they came to the realisation that the challenges  ahead of them is so great, and in which case the six months immediately followed the signing of the agreement should have been better  spent. Most of the people appointed to key government positions had only their AK- 47 as both a qualification and experience, obviously not enough to run an efficient public service especially in a region just recovering from a protracted civil war. Equally disastrous were those brought from the Diaspora, unfortunately most of them were out of their areas of speciality for decades, and whatsoever little they had, would have become out of date if not completely washed out due to disuse.

At this period in time, initially the toddler GoSS wrongly   thought that the six years interim period was going to be such a long time and as such no one took any account of the months and years as they passed by. The SPLM/A accepted to join the government in the month of July 2005 during a rainy season and its impact on their performance as fresh starters were not discerned by those high in the hierarchy. They went and lost their leader in the same month of July due to bad weather as alleged by Abel Alier led team of investigators, yet no lesson was learnt. This was then followed by the controversial National Census which was as well carried out during the rainy season though many oppositions voices were raised expressing  so many discontenting issues,  prominent amongst them remains to  the chronic inaccessibility of most parts of south Sudan during the rainy season.  This unfortunately was also not taken as a learning event to be possibly avoided in future encounters.

Now another  rainy season has also been chosen for the country’s  expected  to be  possibly the first fair and transparent democratic elections in the entire history of this country, though such a thing never exists in the developing countries and especially so in the  African continent which has addicted military dictatorship for quite a long time.

I am not trying to be superstitious in anyway, but it seems that the National Islamic Front/ National Congress Party NIF/NCP) of al Bashir has realised that the SPLM/A is missing so much on metrology, and time and time again it can be out played to carry out very important and crucial political events during the rainy seasons though it is an established fact that many parts of south Sudan becomes completely inaccessible in such times. Al Bashjr himself worked as an officer in the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and fought wars in the jungles of the south, which leaves him as an equal expert in the seasonal changes which happen in that part of the country and the same applies to all his fellow Islamic jihadists whom he surrounds himself with in the republican palace in Khartoum. So why all this intended ignorance on the part of all the signatories to the CPA?

Going back to the history of the Sudan since the dawn of the so called independence in 1956, all major events in the country from elections to population census had all been carried out during the dry seasons extending from January to April, so why the sudden deviation from what is to be considered a time tested experience, if at all there is nothing fishy underneath.

Not to notice this clear pattern in NIF/ NCP calculated delays in implementing the CPA would amount to political insensitivity and indifference. Al Bashir intentionally delayed the electoral bills as well as formation of the electoral committee, with the sole intension of holding the voting process in the rainy season, a clearly indented act of state sponsored sabotage.

Though the GoSS sought an expert opinion from the UN panel in south Sudan, does not in any way relief it from being a part to this election timing blunder. The SPLM lead Goss in the expert in the south as far as the weather is concerned. Southerners are expected to be aware of what can be done in their region at what time of the year more so than any other posing expert out there.

However the so-called UN expert advice to delay the 2009 election so that the whole of the 2009 dry season would be spent on registration of voters, 2010 for the elections and finally the 2011 dry season for the referendum has been received with a lot of mixed feelings.

It is no secret that most south Sudanese are already fed up of remaining under an Arab Islamic rule of Khartoum, which has been all this time playing political hide and seek games with the south. It a general feeling in the streets of south Sudan that the sooner the south is out of this nasty association with the north the better as many feel that even SPLM is holding the  whole of south Sudan as a hostage in order to enrich its members. Everybody believes that if the south is free and independent of Khartoum, then all the crooked and corrupted policies adopted under the NCP/SPLM partnership, can be immediately corrected.

Now because the planners from both the north and south Sudan have chosen to either ignore the science of metrology or use it cunningly to manipulate policies on the ground, the whole country is made to sail into a completely unchartered sea. But whatsoever direction things are going to head, it must be remembered that certain important things like speeding the return of the refugees and the IDPs to their villages, something which should have been finished with, even before the an unpopular population census, the registration of those eligible to vote (the electoral registry), training of polling officers and the enlightenment of the voters. These few out standing issues and many others need a lot of human endeavour and financial support. And whatsoever is done for these coming elections should be done with the 2011 referendum in mind. We don’t have to start from the scratch each time we do something, but we should be building our experiences on top of the previous ones.

I hope that from today all our leaders in south Sudan should become metrological oriented, and it should be a common practice to have a chart in front of them that shows all the months and seasons of the year which would easily reflect the all year round feasibility of conducting any activates in the region in regardless of its magnitude. But as for the currently confused situation on when to hold the elections and the referendum, the south has played directly into the hands of the cunning Islamic Arab north.

The election given the composition of the electoral committee, how long it took Khartoum to name it, and the ICC noose tightening on the president al Bashir, the whole process has been set ready for rigging, an art well mastered by the northern Sudanese Islamists. So putting our hope of any change in the Sudan on this election is actually venturing into the unknown. For the northern parties, it is this election which can see them share power if not change the entire regime. They are for this obvious reason ready to have the election postponed so as to give them enough time to make the necessary collusions, have their hands on the registration process and secure a good campaign. But in case the election is going to be held in 2010, then the Sudanese masses, and the southerners should be ready to put up with the already degenerating government of national unity (GoNU) ruled by the indicted al Bashir and the corruption ridden, decomposing Government of south Sudan (GoSS) of Salva Kiir Mayardit..

Talking of heavy rains in the south in relationship to the government proposed time for holding the election must be viewed in its expected real and implied out comes. If the votes were to be casted in the rainy season, how would that affect the results?  This as it is, depends on the type of collusions which the southern political parties are planning to form with the northern groups. Common sense would have us assume that SPLM will continue to maintain its partnership with the Islamic NCP for their own sake, for the CPA, and avoid venturing into the unknown. ( The devil you know is better than the angel you don’t know)  in which case the two parties should have agreed on only one presidential candidate surviving an all weather proof elections, but unfortunately this is not the case now.

And obviously  given the fact that  common sense itself is not common, especially in the  Sudanese politics and in particularly its elements that have to do with the north – south relationships , both the NCP and the SPLM may be forced by the racial element  currently overshadowing the political scene to forge different alliances which would rather reflect the long avoided direct  Arab vs. African confrontation by declaring a black African presidential candidate to be backed by all the marginalised people of the Sudan or on the other hand SPLM may,  for tactical reasons prefer to revert to its long time opposition allies of the National Democratic Alliance ( NDA) and take it from there as the last two options would to some 4xtend endorse a delay in the elections.

However, for the southern Sudanese, the coming election is  important as it will offer an opportunity for the masses to have their say on the SPLM led GoSS which has been accused of widespread corruptions and gross incompetence. The people of the south Sudan now are looking forwards to bring the right people who can push the wheels of development forwards, install in place an accountable and a fairly representative government with a clear vision of an independent inclusive democratic south Sudan. The post 2009 government in south Sudan must be formed of people who would swear to see that the 2011 referendum for self-determination takes place as scheduled in the CPA and they should also be prepared to share the pride of declaring the long awaited independence of south Sudan in 2011 and not later than that. This last option has no room for patience which has since long ran out, and the sooner the change comes the more the people will be confident that very soon they will have an independent south Sudan state.

The author is a south Sudanese doctor living in the UK, and can be reached at