A South Sudan official in Abyei has denounced Khartoum’s plans to hold elections in Abyei without the involvement of other stakeholders. Deng Biong issued the statement in response to Sudan’s move to hand out more than 5,000 cards bearing Sudanese national numbers to Abyei communities, ahead of the country’s elections slated for April this year. He said although Abyei is still a contested area, the vote will not have a big impact. He said that in case some people in the disputed area are registered and vote, they will vote like other Sudanese. That means they will probably vote for representatives in Jebra or Al-haji Yusuf. “If this is the case, we do not care. But we would like to emphasize that elections held within Abyei will not have any relationship with the government of Khartoum. Proof of this is that Abyei was not a geographical constituency during the 2010 elections,” he said. Biong accused the Sudanese government of backing a resettlement project of Misseriya tribesmen in Abyei, in violation of agreements signed between the Juba and Khartoum governments. The Khartoum government has been establishing fixed villages for the nomadic herdsmen in the area. Biong revealed that he has already requested the international community to intervene in the issue. He said that he had brought the issue to the attention of the government of South Sudan, United Nations Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA), the United Nations and the African Union. “The Government of Sudan does not want to handle quickly the final solution for Abyei problem, and this tactic is to buy time. Currently, they have entered into programmes outside the agreements on Abyei, for example, they have gone to the villages to localize Misseriya by building for them concrete houses,” he said. TCT contacted the Sudanese embassy in Juba to respond to these claims. By the time of publishing the story, the embassy was yet to respond.
Posted on: Thu, 08 Jan 2015 12:57:39 +0000
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