President Salva Kiir swore in Taban Deng Gai as first vice president of South Sudan on Tuesday, replacing Riek Machar, who hasn’t been seen nor hear from since fighting broke out earlier this month between his forces and those loyal to the president.In an exclusive interview yesterday, Machar spoke with Al Jazeera’s Sami Zeidan, criticising Deng Gai’s appointment. “I’m still the first VP of the republic of South Sudan,” said Machar. “The appointment made yesterday by President Salva Kiir is illegal. It has no basis because the peace agreement does not give him the powers to appoint a first VP under the current circumstances. As you know the appointment of Taban from the perspective of SPM and SPMIO is not acceptable because he has defected and joined the faction of President Salva Kiir. He cannot appoint someone who has defected to replace me.”
Machar added, “With the appointment, he [Kiir] has taken the furthest step for the collapse of the peace agreement. I am waiting for the international community and regional body to say they will deploy troops to Juba and once they do that I will return to implement the agreement but what Kiir is doing is against the peace agreement and indicates it’s collapsing.”
Machar confirmed he was “around Juba” but denied he was about to order his troops to march on the capital and reinstate him by force. “We will wait and have been waiting… As long as the international community and the regional third party force are beingwaited to deploy, we will not disrupt that, but if they fail, this will be an indication that the whole agreement is forsaken, by the international community and the regional body that brokered the peace agreement.”
Listen to the full interview at http://www.aljazeera.com/
I wish the Southern Sudanese people would sit down more and agree on the way forward so that they can tackle issues of development. As Africans, we are all too tired of these infighting.
There are more pressing issues for both Salva Kiir and Riek Machar to solve. War is a very poor means of solving disputes. As a learned man, Machar knows this. During his many conflicts with John Garang (both highly educated men with PhDs), the favourite joke from ordinary Southern Sudanese was that phd is an abbreviation for poverty, hunger and disease. They are right. So many “paper agreements” have been signed which each party have been quick to disregard in the blink of an eye. The sad thing is, each sides keeps blaming the other!
I have so many friends from there, having worked with them for many years in a humanitarian context. I still follow developments there very closely as I do with the rest of the world.
I hope peace returns to Juba soon. These two leaders need to sit down and think seriously about the future of their people and countrymen.
South sudanees can not build statehood in south sudan. These
People do not know the art of state
building. The South sudanees are akin
To Hawiye clan in Somali who are against the rebirth of news Somalia.
The Hawiye clan in somalia wishes
Hawiye clan state in somali pennisula.
The Dinka and Nuware do not want
A state that reflect the interests of both Dinka and Nuware. South Sudan
was more stable when this entity was part and parcel of Sudan. Only political stability would return to South Sudan if latter reunite Sudan