Final national dialogue report to be published
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Last year’s national dialogue report is due for publication for public consumption, the former Deputy Rapperteur to National Dialogue, Francis Mading Deng told media in Juba last week.
Deng spoke during the handing over of the final report to the African Union Commission Representative to South Sudan Ambassador Joram Biswaro.
Necessitated by series of constant conflicts, the national dialogue was conceived in 2016 and was supported by South Sudanese as a popular demand aimed at solving political, economic and communal violence in the country.
The dialogue conference was conceived to end all forms of violence, re-establish unity, address issues of diversity as well as settling historical disputes in the country.
South Sudan is struggling with political and economic hardships not to mention the nagging cyclic inter-communal violence.
Efforts being made
The deputy rapporteur Francis Mading Deng told media that they are in a consultation with UNDP to see into it that the report can be published.
“We had arrangements with UNDP to publish the national dialogue into four or five volumes so that it can be more accessible to the public,” Mr. Deng said.
He said they are at the juncture of implementation of the recommendation for the outcome of the conference, adding the national dialogue was not an event but rather part of the people culture to resolve conflicts.
“People have dialogue, they always resolve their problems by talking and talking reveals problems which may not be known forward,” he emphasized.
“One of the main principles of the national dialogue has been transparency, inclusivity, accountability and entegrity.”
He said the move taken by President Kiir to initiate the dialogue was somewhat opposed by political elites.
“You all know very well that when president initiated the national dialogue [you] were heard skeptics saying that this is simply a ploy by the President to polish his image but nothing [else]- just a political motivation of ideologies,” Deng said.
The preliminaries of the idea paved the way forward for the grassroots level consultation, regional and up to national level. The move was later followed by three regional conferences which concluded with the national dialogue conference held in Juba capital last year.
The report was containing about over 20 sections submitted to South Sudan AU Representative.
“So, you can say we had some 20 plus reports now that have been prepared. We had intended to submit all these to the presidency earlier. But for a variety of logistical and political reasons, we need to discuss some of the critical issues we had to publicly debate on the issue,” he said.
Mr. Deng assured that the think-tank institutions such as Sudd, Ebony, University of Juba and the Church will be given tasks to follow-up the recommendations of the national dialogue.
Politics within
In early January this year, a controversial document emanated within the national dialogue committee alleging that the conference had recommended the removal of President Kiir and First Vice President Dr. Riak Machar.
However, the statement was later refuted by co-chair of the national dialogue, saying the circulated document was not from them but from a splinter group that walked out of their meeting.
He asserted that certain group within the committee did not go through formal adoption of the document when final meeting was shared by steering committee.
“What happened after the conference [is that] the leadership decided to have a statement of the steering committee. However, the document then became partially controversial because there were some ideas that came up in the recommendation [that] made the co-chair to withdraw the document,” Mr. Deng explained.
The AU Commission Representative to South Sudan, Ambassador Joram Biswaro said, AU will ensure that the follow-up to expedite the dialogue document is a vital step.
“We are looking forward as African Union that the follow-up mechanisms which is within the recommendations of this good final work will soon or later form follow the work which has been done,” Amb. Biswaro stressed.
He said grassroots level views stated in the document should be incorporated into the permanent constitution of the country.
