Tensions Rise as South Sudan Votes
Tensions Rise as South Sudan Votes
As South Sudan citizens this week cast their ballots in a referendum on independence, IWPR’s Africa editor Blake Evans-Pritchard assesses what lies in store for southerners if they vote for secession.
There’s some concern that separation will lead to renewed bloodshed, but would President Omar al-Bashir want to start a war that could weaken his own hold on power?
Could the referendum lead to conflict?
It is very unlikely that, whatever the outcome of the poll on January 9, there will be a return to full-scale conflict. Both northerners and southerners incurred heavy losses during the country’s decades-long civil war, and neither side has much of an appetite for going back into armed conflict again.
There have been reports of isolated clashes between ethnic groups in some areas, but this probably just represents tribal leaders and politicians at a local level jostling for positions of power in what they imagine will be a newly-independent country next year. South Sudan isn’t a homogeneous region. There are hundreds of tribes and ethnic groups, which all think they should have a say in how the new country will be run.
The ongoing violence in Western Equatoria is different. This is caused by remnants of Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army, LRA, that continue to pillage and loot in the area, as well as further afield, in Central African Republic, CAR and the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC. But such violence is unlikely to lead to full-scale war.
The danger would be if Khartoum was to somehow block South Sudan’s bid for secession. I don’t think that Khartoum would be so short-sighted as to do this, though. President Omar al-Bashir wouldn’t want to fight a protracted war that might threaten the survival of his regime.
Some have suggested that Khartoum may use proxies to affect the outcome, as it has done in the past. For example, a few southern tribal groups could be persuaded to reject the referendum as unfair. However, Khartoum’s divide-and-conquer policies have left the regime with few regional allies these days.
How prepared is South Sudan for independence?
Southern politicians, many of whom fought in the country’s bitter civil war, are champing at the bit to be rid of the influence of Khartoum. Few have much time for the suggestion that the semi-autonomous regime will not be able to survive once it is on its own. There is widespread feeling that Khartoum has done more harm than good in the region.
However, one can’t ignore the fact that the south is less developed than the north. You only have to spend a few hours bouncing along in the back of a rickety bus to appreciate this. In the north, many of the main roads between cities are freshly paved – a sign, perhaps, of how the oil wealth and Chinese investment has benefitted the north.
Most people accept that the south needs large amounts of aid to be able to stand on its own feet, which will probably come from the United States and the European Union. The south may be rich in minerals, but at present doesn’t have the resources to for its citizens’ basic needs.
All the signs are that southerners would like to maintain close ties with the north, and this could also help it develop. While the bulk of Sudan’s oil lies in the south, the infrastructure to process and export it lies in the north. When I met Riek Machar, vice-president of South Sudan, some months ago, he told me that he favoured agreements with Khartoum to help with the processing and refinement of oil. That would probably be a good thing for both sides.
One problem I see is how unaware many ordinary southerners of what independence means. They think that they will wake up on the morning of January 10 and be living in an independent nation state. They don’t realise that building an entire nation takes time. The government must think about forging a new currency, agreeing visa permissions with the north, and so forth. This is a long process, which is why the country will have a six-month transition period before becoming fully independent.
Why is Abyei getting its own referendum?
Under the terms of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, CPA, Abyei, a relatively small area in the southern half of the country, will hold its own referendum to decide whether it wants to be part of the south or part of the north. The intention had been to hold the Abyei vote on the same day as the south’s referendum, but it now looks unlikely that the region will be ready in time. The referendum will probably be held a few months later.
The question of whether Abyei lies in the north or the south has been disputed for years. The question matters for two main reasons. Firstly, until quite recently, many of the country’s largest oil fields were considered to be part of Abyei. Furthermore, Abyei is an important route for the Arab Misseriya tribe, who bring their cattle down to graze on southern pastures. If Abyei were to become part of the south, they fear they could lose these grazing rights.
For years during the war, Abyei was an important stronghold for southern rebel forces. However, a peace agreement signed in 2002 placed Abyei squarely in the north, by relying on boundaries that existed at the time of independence in 1956.
This uncertainty over the status of Abyei gave rise to calls for the region to hold its own referendum. The difficulty has been in deciding who is eligible to vote in the referendum, given that Abyei’s borders are still disputed and many inhabitants of the area are nomadic.
