AU, parties holed up in election discussions
The African Union delegation and parties to the 2018 peace deal are still locked up in discussions on the plight of the 2023 elections.
The delegates who began their sitting mid-week have been busy discussing the prospects of the poll amid growing anxiety over its possibility.
The details of the discussion are yet to be disclosed to the public, as no party was ready to give a statement when The City Review accessed the venue of the meeting yesterday.
The delegation comprises the AU, UNDP, IGAD, R-JMEC, and UN and held meetings with the Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Minister of Interior, Minister of Cabinet Affairs, Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs, Ministry of Peacebuilding, and civil society organizations, including Speakers and deputy Speakers of the national parliament.
According to the inside information The City Review acquired yesterday, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement in Government (SPLM-IG) and Sudan People’s Liberation Movement in Opposition (SPLM-IO) were locked up in discussions from 9 am until 1 pm, while OPP, SSOA, and the Former Detainees separately met with the group from 2 pm until 7 pm.
However, the partners and parties declined to disclose what exactly they have discussed with the delegation when approached by The City Review.
The AU election delegates are expected to end their mission today.
Last week, the mission, led by Prof. Babatunde Fagbayibo, including UNDP’s Professor Abraham Kuol Nyuon and Ahmed Isaac Hassan, arrived in the country to gather inputs from all stakeholders on the country’s readiness for the constitution-making process and elections.
The visit comes after several reports from both local and international organisations warning the parties of conducting rushed elections.
Also, Yasmin Sooka, the Chair of the United Nations Human Rights Commission on South Sudan, echoed the same sentiments, saying that the country is at a critical juncture in its transition with crucial provisions of the Revitalized Peace Agreement still unimplemented, and planned elections would plunge the country into massive violence.
Yasmin who presented the UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan’s Sixth Report to the Human Rights Council warned the repercussions of a hasty election in a contested political system without the necessary security and democratic circumstances in place might be deadly.
“Both constitution-making and elections require considerable legal, institutional, security, and logistical arrangements that are still unestablished. Beyond these key legal and procedural considerations, it is critical to recognise the risks of further polarisation and political violence around elections, particularly when the insufficient groundwork has been laid for the process,” she said.
Meanwhile, the official spokesperson of the South Sudan Opposition Alliance (SSOA), Brig. Gen. Samuel Shan, recently cautioned that failure to unify forces before the elections would make the country incapable of running a free and fair election.
