Pipeline: A Chord of Neo-colonization

If you were tuned to the world media in the recent weeks, Sudan came up top on international criticisms over attacks on South Sudan, not certainly verbally but apparently militarily. In this same week, the bloodletting of the Arab Spring neither abated but increased in Syria and Yemen nor did the everlasting Palestinian-Israeli hostility stop the Palestinians Freedom Riders from boarding the Jewish settlers’ bus in demands of their freedom. Unlike Sudan and South Sudan, several chords bond the residents of the Holy Land together. They are intertwined in the land, leading to the hostilities that run deep that only the Divine can unravel

But for Sudan and President Bashir, brutality is the chord that holds the country together. In this situation, the demands of the Sudanese in Darfur, Kordufan and the Blue Nile seem nothing but a teleological Sudanese syndrome of war in which togetherness could only be redeemed through more brutality. And this means holding on to people that the chord of unity does not support.

Recent threats against South Sudan and possible cross-border attack are indications that the chord binding South Sudan and Sudan is still held at heart by Khartoum besides the fact that the physical chord may be nonexistent or in the process of breaking. As usual, in the words of Abel Alier, all mess begins with dishonoring of agreements. The abrogation of the CPA in the case of Abyei and trashing of Popular Consultations hope for the people of South Kordufan and the Blue Nile regions have commenced Khartoum’s blasphemous killing spree. Memories of the past war chanting were in the air again.

And as usual, the Western World wasn’t moved. It appears people come in when somebody mentions the possibility of genocide. And this usually gives Antonov pilots and tank drivers of a bloodthirsty regime an upper hand to sonorously chant Jihadists’ hymns as they march on to their famous killing fields in the South.

It always begins with scornful language as an antecedent followed by ruthlessness and cruelty. As evidently witnessed even by the United Nations, the language employed by President Al Bashir and his military commanders was full of militaristic sarcasm. They were the preceding pretexts followed by displacement of civilians in Kurmuk and aerial bombardment of refugees deep inside South Sudan territory. Sudan-backed rebel attacks on South Sudan heralded this planned disruption of life in South Sudan.

Khartoum, in such actions, was invitingly luring South Sudan into a confrontation and waylaying her for a military showdown. And as Susan Rice from United Nations warned ‘South Sudan not to take the bait and respond in kind,’ it was already evident Sudan has offered South Sudan the war bait. Sudanese military fighter jets’ bombing of refugee camps and South Sudan rebels armed to the teeth by Khartoum wreaking havoc on civilians were undoubtedly many types of baits too luscious to ignore. But as one would wonder, what is the underlying reason for this show of aggression by Sudan and what will she achieve in a military confrontation with South Sudan?

It is all bitterness and one chord that still lingers between the two: the oil pipeline.

Recent events in Sudan are categorically and presumably the consequences of the failure of the New Sudan agenda and clear signs of the eventual implosion of the Sudanese republic in the swirling heat of dissatisfaction under the imposition of one fragment of a country’s civilization identity on the rest. However, evasive authorities in Khartoum are playing the game differently, the truth will always haunt them. The reality is that no matter how the juggernaut Khartoum’s military power and prowess might be, suppressing the will of the neglected masses through violence and vanquish will never ever bring peace. There is no way a government can be victorious over citizens that keep it in power. If at all there ought to be victory between the people and their government, it is always the people that emerge victorious, not the government. The government, as seen across many of the world’s nations, is a creation of the people.

Sudan is yet to come to terms with the reality that South Sudan is an independent country and a member of the United Nations, just like Sudan, operating on equal terms and privileges that a sovereign nation would do. The name South Sudan chose during independence must not dupe Khartoum for a possible forceful reunification of the two countries at any time in the future, not even militarily. The chord that bound them together had been broken for eternity.

So, why threatened and attacked South Sudan?

This may not be a threat per se but a clear sign of the start of what Khartoum had always threatened the South: disruption of oil supply and blockading the region for eventual suffering. Surreptitious support of the rebels against South Sudan is something already palpable and widely confirmed by studies. Small Arms Survey group had confirmed that a copy of AK-47, Type 56-1 used by the rebels against South Sudan is a Chinese cloned and supplied by Khartoum. The attack on the town of Kuek that killed 13 South Sudanese was a clear whistle of war though not answered on equal terms by Juba. International media in the region witnessed it. Lambasting and vilification of South Sudanese by Bashir himself as ‘'not conquerors of the country they live in now’' was also a well-intended provocation to lure the new nation into a violent confrontation in order to achieve the ultimate objective. The disparagement seems to suggest, ‘if you think you were conquerors then come out now and try it with us.’

Pipeline is off! Will such an announcement appease Khartoum? Yes, certainly. The truth is that all operations will come to a standstill in South Sudan.

And with the unsubstantiated reports in the media that South Sudanese leaders have amassed and stashed the sum of approximately 400 million dollars in foreign accounts, there is little concern that a threat of stoppage of cash and oil flow as a result of foreign aggression means anything. The kids and their many mothers are assured, at least financially whether there is going to be an economic blackout in the country or not.

South Sudan needs to be aware that bitterness in Sudan will never subside as long as there is an oil pipeline chord still tying Sudan and South Sudan together? And above all, the realization by many Sudanese socio-political vanquished groups that the fruits of struggle can be reaped whenever you hold a long and vicious war as epitomized in South Sudan has added a new interplay into the game.

South Sudan must willingly dissociate with the old republic of Sudan but the chord, in the form of a pipeline, will continue to be an instrument of harassment to the South Sudanese economy, and this may lead to the frivolity of consumerism in the near future. Before Khartoum shuts down this chord of neocolonialism, let an alternative route for the oil be found. Relations with Sudan will never be good and if we don’t believe it, we are living in fantasy.

South Sudan and the Arab Spring: The Minister on Willful Resource Grabbing

Just as the popular axiom illustrates, ‘for whatever has a beginning there is an end,’ it is the end of the climax of the Libyan revolutionary struggle against the regime of Gadhafi. It is also the stall point in the sense that the people of Libya have achieved what they fought for in the wake of several months of the uprising against Colonel Muammar Gadhafi, a leader loathed so much by the West and praised abundantly by the African Union and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. Chavez seems charmed by Gaddafi’s arrogance in keeping the opposition at bay at home and hauling over the coals the Western condemnations against his regime. In any nous, they share dictatorial arrogance and bravery – blind bravery. 

The West hated Gaddafi for his eccentric and enigmatic support of Al Qaeda activities in the Arab world and most disturbingly, the bombing of the Pan American World Airline flight 103 – known tragically as the Lockerbie Bombing – over Scotland in the UK in 1988. Gadhafi had also made Europe lived with the awful experience of bitterness through internal meddling. This was evident in Libya arming the IRA in Northern Ireland.

The African Union on the other hand is a baby of Gaddafi. He was adored and almost nearly worshipped by its leadership so that he could keep the organisation sufficiently funded thereby eliminating unscrupulous processes of soliciting aid from the Western World. This near-total dependence on him made him hoped and believed that he could one day become the president of Africa. This commitment was clear in Libyan offering of huge financial support to the weak AU that did so little to stop the killing in Darfur by the Sudanese government through their counter-insurgency unit - the Janjaweed. His personal attires, festooned with maps of Africa are overt scenes of his deep admiration for the continent. He saw himself as a model and yearned to be recognised as its father- father of Africa. 

Realistically, many African leaders who rejected Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) in its initial stages of the war appeared like parodies on Gadhafi’s highway to a very long reign in power. Others like Chadian president, Idris Derby, had their own motives in supporting him all the way through. But why is Libya, under the auspices of a well-crafted Green Book that led her to relative stability and a strong economy in both Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa not satisfied with Gadhafi?

It is a question that will always linger around. In African political demagogue, leaders pledge many developmental and social reforms when seeking and biding for power; a stepping stone to be democratically elected into the office and after which a ruthless crackdown on oppositions ensues. Constitutions eventually become menus that could be changed overnight to solidify grip on power. This is a politico-ideological disease that has infested the Arab world and perhaps, the Arab world, too, does not look very different from Africa in this regard. 

One wonders if the Arab Spring, as the uprising throughout the Arab world is referred to, is not moulding other dictators to replace the incumbent ones whom they seek to overthrow through mass protests. In the Libyan case, an armed insurrection was the fundamental tool because all other political persuasions to introduce democracy never moved Gadhafi. He viewed such attempts as cheap shenanigans. The question, therefore, remains as to whether the NTC will not stall and a hard-won liberation handed over to other dictators in waiting, as is the case in Egypt. Libyans should be quizzical with the NTC leadership and these leaders too must show that they are immune from power hunger and demonstrate that they will not turn against the very civilians who look upon them for change as exhibited by Bashar in Syria.

It all starts with resources. The government of the people must use the country’s resources to the satisfaction of the populace. Irregularities and desire to amass country’s resources for one’s ethnic, religious sect and regional affiliations cannot redeem the country, rather, they will jettison it into a free fall in the direction of the abyss of corruption and other socio-political degeneracies.

It is in light of this question that one is forced to reflect on the situation in South Sudan. The wind of independence is abating and the country is beginning to be habituated by her erstwhile-displaced population, trickling in from the diaspora and from the Sudan. The imperfective meditation that the two Sudans will remain a single entity or under a convoluted confederacy even after the breakaway of South Sudan is now an obvious past. Or was it an academic twist to the war possibly orchestrated by South Sudanese?  It needs time to be fully comprehensible. But one thing is clear, Sudan will always remain a foreign land. Today, South Sudanese citizens are looking up to the tutelage of their leaders to transform their homeland into a liveable community. But will this thought intercommunicate with the desire of the flamboyant leaders who see the national cake as something to grab for oneself and one’s own people?

A recently formed government of president Kiir has a minister who thinks that regional enrichment will answer the quest for development. All across South Sudan, states that felt happy for having been awarded sufficient ministerial positions went out in celebration and called for fancy thanksgiving parties, not to the president but to their elected ministers for having made it to the top. It started with Western Bahr El Ghazal, then Western Equatoria before the deprived state of Northern Bahr el Ghazal wiped out tears of disquietude and misrepresentation in the national government and held a party for their two sons who were appointed  ministers in the national government.

In all these parties, comments made by various leaders were supportive of the presidential decision to appoint ministers within rank and files of their capable colleagues. Praises to the president were not considerate of calculated forthcoming elections manoeuvres in 2014. Others thought a cumbersome Dinkanisation of the national leadership had finally been broken.

Then came promises and tribal attitudes from the leaders. And none other than Alison Manani Magaya uttered the comments that jerked some patriots who might have illusions that a long time serving professional of that calibre had a key to proper and equitable development knowledge for the country. Manani urged a fellow minister in the foreign ministry who comes from W. Equatoria to fill the books of staff with West Equatorians. 'We are not asking you to put our people there but you must do it.' He elaborated more, 'we have to grab for ourselves too because others are doing it.' 

The comments, if put into action unreservedly as in the words of the pundit himself, would have long term results akin to the precursory grievances that led to the Arab Spring in the Middle East and North Africa. If it starts with grabbing for our regions, what will stop South Sudan from following in the footsteps of Libya? We are at the corner turning left onto the 'Arabian Highway.'

Day of Contentment Replaced the Day of Devastation

Finally, the day has come for South Sudanese, the African Continent, and the world. A new nation is born, the people once marginalized have now spoken by bullets and ballots, and the struggles to achieve an identity had been realized. For South Sudanese, the old slogans of Aluta continua and comradeship, which to many, the meaning and overtone are shadowy, must now continue in different forms - the forms of social-economic development, social cohesion, moral justice, and above all, nationalism and patriotism that can be translated into action for the well-being of citizens who have been devastated by the protracted wars. The challenges are still great and the wind of change is still blowing.

The next war is somehow unconquerable, but maneuverable: the war of development. It demands the correct and astute application of democratic ideals. But with wisdom and good watchfulness and national pride, an impetus in the willpower to advance can be created and this new nation can meander around the giants to the top. It is a small world but there is a place for all that breathes.

So far South Sudanese have learned in the first and second Sudanese civil wars, 1955 – 1972 and 1983 – 2005, that it is not wise to take a bull by its horns. But there are incidences that the only thing you can catch of the bull is only the horn. The impasses of a multifaceted development must be tackled squarely by the horn.

Ideally, on this day of independence, this is not the central theme. Expectations of South Sudanese seem to suggest that they know what lies ahead. I must advise here that economic development is a kind of war that a nation should prepare adequately for. The tides are rough, but manageable if correct and honest strategies are formulated, adhered to, and consistently applied.

The rest of Africa is waiting to haul South Sudan on to the truck of economic development, where the monsters with which several economies wind around, are the Economic Blocs of different kinds: The World Bank, The IMF, and other financiers. It is a figurative and calculative arena that requires a country to prepare its human resources or workforce very well for the competition. Education would be the key to success in such a whirlpool of interests, often marked by legal manipulations. We have a world where we must tread carefully and always lay a low profile. 

South Sudanese should now know that the path towards progress has many potholes of problems, with not a single panacea for these problems. It is where a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. It is a world where no one helps you sign deals but baits you to. Many countries have signed agreements and with that, they lost the trend and poverty became commonplace. And oftentimes you get into eternal hereditary by your own signature. Wise and lucky ones become wealthy. In such countries, children are born with 'original debt' they can never pay in their lifetime. But there is little you can do to surpass the economic mightiness of those familiar with the game. Remember, man has already mass-produced the ultimate weapon. They have a name for it. Human feet have defiled the goddess for some of our communities, the moon, already. The blue sky that forms the everlasting mosquito net over South Sudan has some people living in it up there. 

My dear young nation of South Sudan, welcome to the world of perfidy, the world of national interest, the world of alliances, the world of masters. It is the world of agreements, treaties, memoranda of understanding, and so on. We can live there, can't we? It is better in this world than it is in the land of Janjaweed and Murahaleen. And if you are asking for the solution, then the solution I don't know. Just don't borrow where you can never repay. Own no masters or at least be a master. Develop your human resources or perhaps be a test case in a different scenario. South Sudan can benefit if it chooses to follow the path of successful nations. 

The main focus for the people of South Sudan was to end the marginalization and set themselves free. This had been a subject that often carried an emotional charge. Today South Sudanese have geographical confinement. The truth is that they have always been here. Even prophet Isaiah talked about people that resemble them. The long-desired Promised Land is now right here. It is the milk that is yet to be seen. We needed a home country, a cocoon to recline to when necessary. It is now a full realization and it was an achievement worthy of an attempt. It was an identity we lacked. South Sudanese have so long been made to live with a misnomer that they are part of the Arab world and therefore Middle Easterners. Arabs – black Arabs? The misnomer was baffling and people struggled to shed it for almost half a century.

Now they have got a country they will forever hang on to till the end of time:  the Republic of South Sudan where the word Sudan will really insinuate the ‘Land of the Black.’ With the creation of this new state comes the excitement and jubilation for millions of South Sudanese whom maladroit of war have made to assume the tunnel they were in had no exit where light would appear. Today it is shining at the tunnel’s end for the people of South Sudan. And into the tunnel goes no hope, desire, or willingness for turning back. We are out and free.

In his speech, Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary-General on July 9, 2011, in Juba said that South Sudan has become the 193^rd nation that will soon acquire membership in the United Nations. The African Union welcomes Africa’s 54^th, sovereign state. The East Africans want them on their economic bloc for the next war. South Sudan is a country!

The Africans who have put up with the pressures of Sudanese refugees influx and have borne the brunt of malevolent of a lingering war in Sudan have also expressed their joy and support for the new nation. At least a neighbor is at peace. South Sudan was a no-go zone for the rest of business Africa and the world. It is time now for Africa and the world to come and see what Southerners have been fighting for in this land of the Sudd and The Mighty Nile. South Sudanese are saying, ‘You are welcome!!’

And what do South Sudanese think of the day?

The world that has stood with the people of South Sudan through humanitarian sustenance; the world in which generous countries like Australia, UK, America, New Zealand, Norway Canada and others stretched their generosity further and offered millions of South Sudanese resettlement deserve our appreciation. It is on this day that we acknowledge their generosity. We the South Sudanese thank them abundantly. We say unto them “Since you have been with us during our times of need, you are friends indeed and we say thank you.” The new president of the Republic of South Sudan never missed the point of thanking them overwhelmingly today, July 9, 2011, during his swearing-in ceremony in Juba when South Sudan legally declared her Independence.

It is today that many South Sudanese believe that the NCP party in Khartoum, which signed the Comprehensive Peace Agreement with the Southerners in 2005, has acquiesced to sitting down and watching them raised their flag and singing a brand new South Sudan National Anthem. To the South Sudanese, it was a dream comes true; it was the day of reckoning. They have wisely and courageously refused to be dragged back into war willy-nilly in the months leading up to Independence Day, and vehemently avowed to secure their freedom, land, and their future. Aspirations of the people of South Sudan have now been realized after a rough ride.

To the Jellaba in the North, they saw it as a failure in the policy of Arabisation of Black Africa, broken by southern resistance. The African stubbornness in demanding freedom through the opposition of the Sudan’s Mahdism and Muhammedanism of the country had been portrayed throughout the 54 years of war. Southerners have since demanded their rights while steadfastly inclined geopolitically to the free world where human dignity and freedom are prized above religious dogmatism. It is madness to see some people fighting wars in the name of God. God, from an all-powerful angle, has been displayed in the Holy books as truly capable of winning His own battles and does not need human succor and actors for the mission. In the name of whom do the weak humans fight for the powerful? The philosophy of religious affiliation must be psychological to a certain degree.

South Sudanese quest for a secular democratic system of government in Sudan had always been met with ululations and religious chanting that called for war in the name of God. We have been through it long and hard that some boys and girls parted with parents at the tender age of ten and have ever since known nothing but themselves to rely upon for the past two decades.

The breakup of Sudan does not make us happy, not in the least. We the Sudanese citizens both North and South have always wanted to be together. But something went horribly wrong in the political systems of the country. South Sudanese had no options left in their armory of togetherness in a united Sudan. Islamisation policy has destroyed the hopes of many. Southerners had to go and to go they went with everything that is South Sudanese above and beneath the ground. That includes oil and other endowed natural resources. And in the sky and heavens above, we have gone with part of our God that does not declare war on His people for submission.

The break up may leave North Sudan with a sense of fear that a country with more than five hundred ethnic groups, in which 63 or so tribes of South Sudan have already chosen secularism will surely stand the test of hypothetic Arabisation in Africa and not more implosive disintegration. Many experts believe this. Erroneous and palpable of this anathematic Arabisation policy is the statement that Sudan is an Arab Islamic State, while ignoring the fact that a sizeable population of the country is truly African. Additionally, this group of non-Arab neither knows nor understands anything of the policy of ‘die or believe.’ Sudan’s government’s call for Holy War or Jihad upon its own citizens as previously witnessed in Darfur through the use of Janjaweed as a force of counterinsurgency against the African Muslims, and more recently in Abyei, will stand as a testimony to the world that needs to know the truth.

To South Sudanese, both at home and in the Diaspora, it is a freedom worth celebrating.  It is a break in posttraumatic stress that we often fear to speak about. It is a searchlight that exposes our confidence and assertiveness. It is a sudden sigh of relief for unpredictable questions that led to our displacement. It is a calming and sedative force for those whose hopes in the survival of their families have been dashed and replaced with pain that seemed to go on for eternity. 

Independence Day is a great day. This is the day that Southerners: amputated, maimed and artificially deformed as a result of gun wounds, snake bites and animal attacks shed tears of joy and pain for; the day in which those whose bones remained scattered in the open and under the trees of Sudan and Africa for the course of their freedom will be remembered by the living; the day that those whose empty stomaches stopped them from breathing will be called to mind; the day in which we recall when our bodies became deficient in fluids and people fell dried and dropped dead while the mighty Nile never runs dry; the day that the entire social structure of the people of South Sudan which had been devastated by war and its concomitants will certainly be given attention. This is the day that announces the end of the blatant devastation and heralding a new day – the Day of contentment. The day is July 9, 2011.

Kura ya Maoni Kusini mwa Sudan

Ni masaa machache tu ndiyo yamebaki ili watu wa Sudan kusini wapige kura ya maoni itakayoleta uhuru kwa watu. Twasema Kaskazini mwa sudan, "ubaki na ugoigoi wako." Sheria yenu iwe ugombezi wenu. Akilini mwetu kwa nusu ya karne hapa kusini, tuliona dunia ikiwayawaya nu kuyugayuga tukitafuta usaidizi wa kila aina ili tupate haki zetu. Mpira wakati huu uko kwa koti yenu.

Mwayowayo na mkipenda mlia machozi. Mola ni wa kila binadamu naye ni mwenye haki na upendo. Kwaherini. Na msisahau kwamba tutatengana na kufarakana nanyi milele kwa sababu tuliumia sana mikononi mwenu.

Katika vita vya kupigania uhuru, vita ambavyo wataalamu huwaamini ni ndefu barani Afrika, tulikufa kwa risasi, wanyama wa msitu na wa pori walipata chemsha kinywa na miili wetu, wanawake wetu walinajisiwa, wengi wetu walichochewa na kufukuzwa nchini mpaka wakapata makao wa ghafula ughaibuni, tulichekeshwa tukiwa tunajaribu kutulia ugenini, watoto wetu wamezaliwa nje ya nchi hata hawajui Sudan ni upande gani wa dunia, kila kitu kimegeuka na kutugeukia vibaya mpaka akili zetu kwa sababu ya uhayawani wa wachache huku Sudan.

Lakini sasa, ijapo tulidhani Mungu hasikii, tunampatia shukrani, tunamwabudu na kumheshimu kwa kuwa mwishowe, anaonekana kama husikia watu wake, duniani kote na hususan, watu wake Kusini mwa Sudan.

Abwoon D'Bashmaya - The Lords Prayer in Aramaic

Egyptian Interest in South Sudanese referendum: A patriarchy or national interest?

It has emerged from the media recently that Egyptian government and prominent newspaper, Al-Ahram newspaper, had made disapprobation to the Sudanese government for wryly setting the country on the course of separation through a grant adoption of Islamic sharia'a laws, and for further maintaining a divisive crater between the citizens of the north and the south in the same country. 

The editor in chief, Osama Saraya, said that the government of Sudan alone bears the largest part of the tragedy that was lurking in the Sudan. Maintaining doubtfulness on the nature of the mistakes the Sudanese government made in the past which presently appear to warrant the desire for independence among South Sudanese; he believed there were series of blunders committed by the government since it assumed power through coup d'etat in 1989. It should be understood that the National Islamic Front snatched power militarily in 1989 to block the peace deal that was being negotiated by the government of Sadiq al-Mahdi and the Sudan People's Liberation Army. Saraya held strongly to his conscience by asserting that it was the government that emphasized more on the concept of self-determination than southerners.

His preferred modus operandi was for the government to have insisted on integration and included that concept in Northern ideological policies so as to achieve unity and coexistence in the end. Government's failure to pursue such a unionist plane of thinking had - in his thoughts - made the coexistence between the North and the South very difficult and impossible. He called this a sin committed by the government of Sudan. Saraya blamed Sudan too, for the blinding focus and failure to realize that the international powers were ready and lurking behind the Sudanese problem with a view to dismembering the country.

The Sudanese society is aware that Egypt had hopes to have closer relations with the Sudan since Nimeiri's administration. The fantasy behind it all, is to possibly unite with the Sudan under Egyptian hegemony. Earlier visit of president Mubarak to Juba, the first ever visit of an Arab head of state to Southern Sudan, confirmed Egyptian agony over the Sudan, and further highlighting why Egypt would not like to see a divided Sudan. Many scholars and regional strategists see the Sudanese circumstance as a matter of national interest to Egypt.  Egypt, therefore, sees her sphere of influence under threat if countries along the Nile go down the paths of instability and fragmentation. Also, a new country on the Nile means a new geostrategic wrangling over the waters of the Nile as well as a bugging threat to dominant influence bequeathed upon her by the British colonial agreement. The British granted Egypt the role of a shepherd on the Nile for her survival and as part of appreciation in helping Britain administered Sudan, thereby, opening the way to explore the source of the Nile into the interior of Africa.

It was clear that Saraya was right in his doubt because Mubarak's visit to Juba should have come in the wake of Omar Bashir, the country's president. President Bashir's reluctance to visit Juba even when the political atmosphere in the South was ominously laden with separation was an indication that he saw no solution to the situation. Saraya hinted that Egypt had offered advice to the Sudanese government before the 2002 Machakos Protocols and urged that it abandon sharia law for the sake of  maintaining the unity of the country. Even if that advice was heeded, international pressure on Khartoum in which Washington believes Khartoum was among the states responsible for sponsoring terrorism, and Southerners' zeal to wade over to the shore of freedom, would have made no radical change in the realities that were to follow.

Earlier comments in the UAE-based Al-Bayan newspaper by Abdel Rahman Shalgam, Libya’s permanent representative to the United Nation, coincided with the Egyptian fears over the breakup of the country.  Shalgam blamed Khartoum for the damaging Shari’a law embraced by the state. He particularly castigated Hasan al-Turabi for his civilization project which ushered in intensification of fighting in the country through ruthless declaration of Jihad on the southerners.

Southerners, at this historical breaking point, would simply wonder where these voices of reasons were during the two decades of war in which they suffered immensely. To many Southerners, voices emerging at the stage are voices of doom that are blaming themselves for the actions they have not completed right. Nobody will know what Southerners are thinking at this crucial moment. But as the referendum date looms, they will say it loud and clear to Sudan, Egypt and the world what they have been thinking.

Egyptian fears and concerns, more or less, seemed to form a wish of goodwill for a future of peacefulness, good neighborliness and regional stability. But the reality in the Egyptian concern is in the waters of the Nile.

Juba must make Oil Concessions with Khartoum to get Abyei out of the Quagmire

It is imperative that Southern Sudan will overwhelmingly vote for secession in January 2011 referendum as predicted by many keen observers of the Sudanese conflict.  This vote is particularly loathsome to NCP and the entire northern Sudanese population- the economically oppressed and the politically disenfranchised groups by the Muslim/Islamic theocratic leadership.  This makes 2010 and 2011 the years of determination of statehood and survivability. Only one area has become a silver bullet which would, nonetheless, bring about lasting peace in the country, but a threshold for doom to the entire country. This area is Abyei. Abyei had become the footstool where decision-makers rest their feet while debating the future of the country, particularly on wrong and deceitful terms.

The justifiable token for not accepting all the deliberations on Abyei by the NCP Government is not that Abyei holds any significance in the people that live in it for them. The matter in holding on to Abyei at this crucial time is a matter of survival. It is not true to suggest that the transhumance Messeriya herders who seasonally maraud while grazing and watering their livestock in Abyei will be permanently deprived of the use of the resources by southerners - grazing land and water. No supportive historical evidence is present today which can point to any occasions when the Messeriya had unduly been denied grazing and temporary sojourning by the Ngok Dinka of Abyei.

There is something deeper than what is being demanded in a manner particularly so incognito by the Sudanese government and the ruling party, the NCP. Many writers and analysts have highlighted this several times and have come to the conclusion that Sudan’s precious commodity in Southern Sudan is oil. About 80% of the Sudanese revenue is known to come from oil, and much of this lies in southern Sudan, a region presently threatening to go away as an independent sovereignty. What will happen to North Sudan economy should southern Sudan leave with all the oil? What are the guarantees that southerners will, in the near future, decide to reunite with northerners to form a much-desired United New Sudan? And what is the point of holding on to Abyei when all the Sudanese citizens in the north know that the Nine Ngok Dinka chiefdoms are indeed Dinka People and, therefore, Southerners?

Somebody doesn't have to be a rocket scientist to discern the demand of the Sudanese government, hidden behind the status of Abyei. But this demand can be asked politely and southerners would consider a brotherly option for it. Clamouring and displaying higgledy-piggledy demeanours will not solve it. If anything, manners as such can destroy the country. Abyei has always been a Southern territory and its administrative sway in the twentieth century does not make it a Northern area of jurisdiction. The point is clear to all Sudanese. It is therefore incumbent upon the SPLM and NCP to do something about the heavy anchor in Abyei's matter. Something has to be done before unconditional return to war. No further tricks or clandestine hypotheses of togetherness will normalise this stalemate but oil. Juba must agree to share oil with Khartoum even if it means doing so on a long-term basis allocation. After all, Sudan has always been one country. This gesture will be honourable to all Sudanese.

This is hard to fathom, but it is evident that before the end of the year and without a concrete breakthrough, Sudan will go to war based on the premise of protecting the right of Messeriya nomads and on salvaging the land of the Ngok Dinka and the oil fields.  Should this happens both NCP and SPLM will carry the burden of the blame. The variance of the war to be waged by either side cannot be conclusively attributed to one party, but the probability that NCP will wheedle the Messeriya to jumpstart the war is one. This affirms the normative argument put forward by NCP that Messeriya, who are the majority in the area and native to nearby Muglad, are to be considered inhabitants of Abyei and therefore, have inalienable right to vote in the deciding referendum for Abyei. Professor Mading Deng disputed the concocted right of the Messeriya to vote in Abyei's referendum on the United Nation TV a few days ago in a response to the Sudanese ambassador in the USA. The ambassador reiterated his government’s call to allow the Messeriya herders to vote. professor Mading quipped and said, “There is no need for a referendum in Abyei then if the Messeriya are allowed to vote. The Messeriya  are the majority in the area and giving them the option on the future of Abyei automatically means they will want to keep Abyei under Northern administration.” He went on to say that what is needed the most is the capacity to build trust between the Messeriya and Ngok Dinka. Some harmonious platform that will allow the two communities to remain in an acceptable coexistence with each other as well as to coexist as peaceful neighbours irrespective of the future of Abyei.

So, where is the logic with which Khartoum is forcing the Messeriya to take up such a radical position on Abyei? The Messeriya were part of the peace delegation five years ago. They knew that the Comprehensive Peace Agreement granted Ngok Dinka suffrage in a referendum to decide their future. Their main complaints as herders at the time were their animals and how they would survive if Abyei went to South Sudan administratively. This complaint was addressed adequately in the CPA.  Existing cordial relationships between the two communities were held in high regards during peace negotiations. The undeniable right to grazing and watering the animals on the part of the Messeriya was part of the agreements. What then makes Messeriya think that the CPA was wrong and the Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling was also a bluff? The answer could be found in the oil.

To break the deadlock on Abyei, freeze war, inculcate a mutual understanding among the Sudanese citizenry and solicit a mutually assured development between the two sides of Sudan, the South should, by virtue and wisdom, allow the North to share oil with it.  This natural bounty is the last thing that keeps the two Sudan together.