Posts Tagged Sudan

Sudan Watch has a very informative post regarding the recent talks between Northern and Southern Sudan and the January 2011 referendum.  They have compiled a number of news stories which address many of the issues and obstacles that both parties face as the referendum draws near.

I would love to hear your take.  Have a great week.

Justin

The biggest question we have received as we transition into His Voice Global is , “How will this affect the continued ministry in Sudan?” Hear Vernon speak about the exciting things going on in Sudan::

His Voice Global:: Continued Ministry In Sudan from Amber Burger on Vimeo.

Watch out, people, I have been ranting up a storm over at the ol’ moedidde blog.  But I’ve been trying to stop blogging about the elections, because I find myself just saying the same things over and over again.  Instead, I’ve been plotting a post that Vernon suggested to me–an overview of Sudan’s Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).  In fact, he suggested I do a video blog, which I thought was a fantastic idea! But, my camera that records video was recently loaned to a friend..and I’ve been waiting and waiting to get it back for said video blog.  The fact that you’re reading my writing instead of hearing and seeing me now is a clear sign that said friend still has said camera.  So there’s an exciting tidbit of my life that has led to my recent stall in blog posts here at His Voice, and is now leading to my just-going-ahead-and-writing-the-post. Feel free to suggest another topic that I can video post on in the future.

So. The CPA.  Whew. Take a deep breath, everyone! Here goes….

The CPA, also known as the “Naivasha Agreement”  was signed between North & South Sudan in 2005, after a 22-year long civil war that killed 2 million people and displaced 4 million.  The CPA outlined for six years of Southern semi-autonomy, after which a referendum would come to vote, giving Southern Sudan the opportunity to secede from Sudan, becoming a fully-autonomous nation (which, as of now, is on course for 2011).

The main points within the CPA include:

• The Machakos Protocol – implements the 6-year period during which Southern Sudan rules itself as a semi-autonomous region, forming their own government and yet continuing to “report” to Northern Sudan.  It is after this 6-year period (ending in 2011) that Southern Sudan will have the right to vote in a referendum for unity with Sudan or full secession. Halfway through this period, there shall be national elections (the ones that just took place in April 2010 were originally meant to have occurred in 2008, which would have allowed for a more reasonable amount of time to prepare for the Southern secession referendum).
• Power Sharing – Both North and South Sudan members will be represented in the national government (70/30 with NCP holding majority), including members of the newly formed Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS). Meanwhile, more power shall be given to individual states.
• Wealth Sharing – 2% of the oil revenue will go to oil producing states of Southern Sudan with the remaining revenue divided among the two governments. This section also has protocol for banking and currency in Sudan.
• Resolution of the Abyei Conflict – Abyei, one of the most protested areas of Sudan due to its mass of oil wealth and central location, will be granted special administrative status.  At the end of the 6-year period, Abyei will vote to either maintain this status within Northern Sudan, or become an official part of Southern Sudan. Oil revenues for Abyei should be split (50/42) with NCP holding the majority and the remaining percentage going to local states).
• Resolution of the Conflict in Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile – This is a similar situation to the Abyei issue–these regions are centrally located, technically part of Northern Sudan, but ethnically more similar with the South, so it creates a bit of a debacle as to which region they should be a part of. This resolution contains similar protocol for oil shares and borders in these two regions as in Abyei. (FYI Nuba Mountains is in Southern Kordofan.)
• Security Arrangements – Equal numbers of soldiers from both Southern & Northern armies will be combined to form the Joint Integrated Unit (JIU) to provide safety and security in the region (read: to hassle people unnecessarily whenever they want. But that’s just my take on it.) Really, though, as peacekeepers.  While there’s been a lot of small-scale violence, I suppose in general the peace has been kept.
• Permanent Ceasefire – ‘Nuff said.

These are the main points of the CPA.  So what’s the big deal? Seems straightforward enough.

How much of the world perceives the North's treatment of the CPA.

But nothing that involves international politics and conflict is ever very straightforward. The main discrepancies with the CPA have involved the oil revenues which have not been provided to the South as the CPA outlines for them to be, and the Darfur conflict which obviously is the opposite of a ceasefire and has implications throughout the country. While the CPA makes it glaringly clear who should get what oil revenues, the NCP has hesitated to fulfill those contracts because it means less money for them. And while the conflict in Darfur is not a North/South conflict, so technically falls outside of the

constraints of the CPA, it is still preventing the country from overall stability.

So when you hear things in the news about Sudan’s government violating the CPA or the events in the country threatening to not fulfill it, hopefully this gives you an idea of what they’re talking about. At this point in time, the main issue up for discussion is keeping everything in tact and peaceful for the 2011 referendum.

If you want to go more in depth, here is the CPA itself.  And here is a paper I wrote called “Challenges to Peacemaking” that gives more detail specific to the Nuba Mountains region (note: this paper was a collaboration, the portion I wrote on Sudan is the second section).

Well, since I last wrote, a lot has happened in Sudan in regard to the elections.  Here are a few key items:

• It came out that ballots that were supposed to have been printed in South Africa to prevent duplication were in fact printed by the Sudanese government’s printing press, with duplicates (read: election fraud). Oof.

• It was suggested by a team of International Election Monitors that the elections by delayed due to:

1. Deficiencies in media freedom
2. Lack of education on the voting process for those in rural areas (i.e. most of Sudan’s population)
3. A drop in the number of available polling stations
   

   President Bashir speaks on his intent to keep the elections on track, while many throughout the globe wonder about the fairness of holding an election under an internationally indicted political figure.

(Read more here about, according to The Economist (one of my favorite and most trusted news sources), how the Sudanese government is “stacking the odds in its favour” for this election.)

• President Bashir responded to said Election Monitors by suggesting he would cut off the fingers of those who “interfere in [Sudan's] affairs.”  I’d like to think he was speaking metaphorically.
• Luis Moreno Ocampo, the now-famous prosecutor at the ICC, compared Bashir to Hitler, implying that monitoring an election under the rule of a leader indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity will be nearly impossible.

I was trying to keep my hopes up about these elections, praying that they would truly be free and fair.  However, after the past few weeks and the new, unfortunate developments that have occurred, I’m starting to worry.  According to the Sudan Tribune, many within Sudan are even pushing for the elections to be delayed until November, threatening to boycott them in April if not.  If both international consultants AND Sudanese citizens don’t think the country/National Electoral Commission is ready, then I too cast my vote to postpone them.

So, at the end of the day, those of us over on this side of the world who are not International Election Monitors or ICC Prosecutors can only do our best to learn, stay up to date, and pray for peace and justice in Sudan.  In fact, thanks to the folks here at His Voice, I discovered the Sudan Global Day of Prayer that Samaritan’s Purse (an organization my husband worked for that I fully endorse), is spreading the word about.  At the very least, I encourage you to view their daily list of prayer requests in Sudan and say a prayer for the elections, or whatever other events may take their place in the next few weeks.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, Grant Sudan Your Peace.

Well hello there.  As Vernon so kindly mentioned in the previous post, I’m Moe and I’ll be blogging here at His Voice a couple of times a month about Sudan-related topics and news.  I blog about this and many other [extremely random] topics on my personal blog, which I’d love for you to check out.

But enough about that, let’s get started.  Today’s topic: Elections! Oh my!  Sudan’s first general elections in 24 years are coming up next month, tentatively April 11-13, which are to be followed by the referendum on Southern Sudan’s secession next January.  I’ll probably be discussing these two events in my posts quite a bit, as they will inevitably have tremendous aspects on Sudanese society.

After several postponements over the past months, conflicts big and small, ongoing trouble in Darfur, and SPLM  threats to boycott the elections, it looks like these elections might actually be on track to take place, as outlined in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement.  If they do, Sudan will elect a president and various parliamentary members, as well as elections for the Southern region, including President.  Sudan’s current President Omar Al-Bashir is up for re-election for the national presidency, as well as other candidates who you can read more about here.

Yasir Arman, the SPLM nominated candidate for the National Presidency

The latest event that leads me to believe these elections might actually happen occurred last week–BBC reported that the deadlock over parliamentary seats in Sudan had ended, with an agreeable result that the South will now have enough members of Parliament to veto any constitutional changes.  This power is necessary in order for them to ensure that the CPA remains in place.  According to the article, due to last year’s census (which in my opinion, and many others, was a major failure) the South did not have the population representation to have enough seats in parliament to hold this veto power.   But after months of deadlock, they came to an agreement.  Let’s hope that’s good news.

(The article also pointed out that more seats were awarded to Abyei and Kordofan, the areas which house my beloved Nuba Mountains–the area I visited in Sudan and where my husband lived.  I pray that this is good news for our friends there.)

Finally, one more interesting tidbit that I came across this week on Sudan’s national newspaper, the Sudan Tribune, was an op-ed titled “Why Southern Sudanese should vote for Al-Bashir“.  This is a bit of a shocking title for anyone familiar with the country’s history–Al-Bashir is currently wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity, and is potentially up for counts of genocide as well. He is largely known by Southern Sudanese as the mastermind of the violence that killed 2 million of their people and totally destroyed all of their land and belongings.  And yet, this op-ed claims that he is the only candidate that will fully recognize a potential Southern secession.  I find that hard to believe, but even so would not make me want to vote for him (but I’ll save that for a future post titled “Why I don’t think Southern Sudan should secede”).

So, that’s my bit for now.  Please pray for peace and safety in Sudan during this election season–it’s an extremely volatile and tense time and will determine much for Sudan’s future.

For information regarding Sudan’s upcoming elections check out www.sudanvotes.com. It features the reports of 30 journalists from Northern and Southern Sudan. For more information regarding the site itself check out Sudan Watch.