Sudan's south already jubilant at prospect of split

JUBA, SUDAN // On the left, there is a drawing of a raised palm with the word "separation" in Arabic and English; on the right, clasped hands and the word "unity" in Arabic and English. Beneath each is a space for southern Sudan's voters to make the mark that could lead to the creation of the world's newest country.

With two days left until southerners begin marking those referendum ballots to decide whether to separate from the north, the mood in what would be the capital of an independent south Sudan is celebratory, almost giddy.

When Omar al Bashir, Sudan's president, visited Juba on Tuesday - and astonished most observers by promising to support whatever decision the south made - pro-separation activists lined the streets and shouted "Yes, yes, separation, no, no, unity." What started as monthly pro-independence demonstrations have in the past week become daily carnivals celebrating the imminent birth of a new nation.

"Unity? What unity?" scoffed William Lemi, a motorcycle taxi driver born in Juba during the 22-year civil war between north and south that cost an estimated two million lives. "We will all vote for separation on January 9."

Six months ago, delays in setting up the commission charged with overseeing the referendum dimmed prospects of the vote going ahead as scheduled.

But the commission's senior southern official declared this week that the panel was "100 per cent prepared" for the vote, and international observers and diplomats are joining the optimistic chorus.

More than 10,000 election workers have been trained and ballots have been delivered to more than 2,600 polling places, most in the south but a few in the north and in eight countries, including the UAE, with sizeable southern Sudanese communities.

In the United States, where Sudan has been a high-profile foreign policy issue for years, the State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said the Obama administration was optimistic that the vote would be free and fair. "The right signals are being sent both in the north and south in terms of the upcoming referendum and respecting the result," he said.

Washington's confidence stems largely from what is a change of rhetoric, if not substance, out of Khartoum.

Mr al Bashir, who came to power in a military coup in 1989 and was elected to another five-year term in April, has blocked implementation of the 2005 north-south peace deal by deploying stalling tactics to delay the 2008 national census and the elections last April, which took place 18 months later than scheduled.

Yet during his swing through south Sudan this week, he appeared to acknowledge that the division of Africa's largest country was inevitable. Moreover, he embraced it.

"I am going to celebrate your decision, even if your decision is secession," Mr al Bashir said.

"Even after the southern state is born, we are ready in the Khartoum government to offer any technical or logistical support and training or advice - we are ready to help."

Doubts remain about the motives behind Mr al Bashir's apparent change of heart, as do concerns over relations between north and south after the vote and the south's independence, which would take effect in July.

The ruling parties in Khartoum and Juba have not yet reached even basic agreements on a host of complicated "post-referendum arrangements" related to citizenship, wealth-sharing and division of debts and assets, among other issues. The parties have yet to reach an agreement on division of Sudan's substantial oil revenues. Eighty per cent of Sudan's oil is in the south, while the infrastructure for exporting it is in the north, including the port on the Red Sea.

There are also outstanding unresolved issues required for full implementation of the 2005 peace deal, namely demarcation of the contested north-south border, which remains militarised on both sides.

Mr al Bashir also faces legal trouble. He is the only serving world leader to be under indictment by the International Criminal Court, for war crimes and crimes against humanity in the western region of Darfur - accusations he has denied - and an international arrest warrant was issued by the court in April 2009.

The court's prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo said last month that investigators had uncovered evidence suggesting Mr al Bashir had billions of dollars in foreign bank accounts.

In a conversation with US officials in March 2009, Mr Ocampo put the figure at US$9 billion (Dh33 billion), according to a classified US State Department cable obtained by the whistleblower website WikiLeaks.

The Sudanese president's legal predicament and his past policies towards the south make observers such as Zach Vertin cautious about making rosy predictions.

"I think southerners will remain understandably wary, given both a history of false promises from Khartoum and the conflicting rhetoric exhibited by the ruling party in recent months," said Mr Vertin, Sudan analyst at the International Crisis Group.

A senior southern official involved in negotiations with officials from Khartoum said that more serious discussions between the National Congress Party and the south's Sudan People's Liberation Movement will be needed in the coming months.

"We want co-operation. We want peaceful coexistence. We want peaceful borders. We want free movement of goods and services," said Deng Alor, the minister of regional co-operation in the southern government.

foreign.desk@thenational.ae

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