Do northerners think that voting SPLM into Khartoum’s palace is the remedy for unity?
August 12, 2008, Waterloo, Canada - Unity is the risk of sacrificing the blood of the innocents or an opportunity of exploiting the interest of individuals. Days, months and years are counting on the history of Sudan [to reveal] whether her unity will come into play and recognize by all the Sudanese. When we all speak of a united Sudan, it reminds many marginalized communities and begin to reflect or contemplate on what happened to the 1972 Addis Ababa agreement.
How save is the CPA?
CPA [Comprehensive Peace Agreement] is just three years old and enough had not been done to save it from its fragility. [It is important to note that] the Addis Ababa Agreement was breached after ten years. We need to ask the questions: How save is CPA? And how save is the unity of Sudan? In the past, the Addis Ababa Agreement was abrogated before the southerners as being “not a Quoran nor a Bible”; however, CPA for a unity will be referred to as nobody have asked the southerners to vote for unity in the event we vote for a united Sudan. Having a united Sudan or a separate South Sudan is both risky, but as I have defined unity in the opening of my opinion, it is upon the interest of Southerners to take risks and scarifies because the history will come to haunt us in the future.
Is SPLM willing to lead the Sudan?
With the upcoming elections in the Sudan, everyone vehemently asks the above question. Is SPLM willing to lead Sudan? Of course nobody will relinquish the power if given the opportunity. SPLM can possibly lead Sudan for the sake of favouring a united Sudan. However, in the course of governing the Sudan in the favour of unity, it is not a solution in this discursive situation. The history will come to haunt us in the future. The anticipation of having a united Sudan is not in the heart of Islamic fundamentalists and extremists rather than continuing to marginalize and disenfranchise the Black African communities. The ideology of a united Sudan is bowled in the future and is not strategically sustainable to Southerners, even though SPLM is anticipating winning the upcoming election in the Sudan.
The only Northerners who want unity in the Sudan are materialists or business entrepreneurs, who want to prospect their -capital investment opportunities with the Southerners. In this situation, the stakes are too high and expectations are also too high to be achieved. I think SPLM must be very vigilantly prepared to confront issues that will face its sovereign states in the South where its base is. Should SPLM win the 2009 elections, they must know that the opportunity that has presented itself is a taste for power and blackmailing to its own infant nation-the southern Sudan. In this era, southerners do not want the history to repeat itself so that they will see the wound not being healed, but continue to be exacerbated and extricated by the fundamentalistic ideologies of blackmailing them in the name of letting SPLM rule in favour of unity. If Sudan is going to transform itself into a democratic nation, the Northerners should know that having SPLM on the ticket for unity is not on the base of giving them power, but on the base of being democratically elected, institutionally recognized and competent to rule as viable party in the Sudan.
SPLM will rule the Sudan if elected democratically by the people of Sudan; hence, that will send a signal to the international community that Sudan is at the beginning of democratization since the inception of African border partition and demarcation. However, it is worthy to mention that the Islamic government in the Sudan has made Sudan to be Arab nation; therefore, this aggravates much opposition to SPLM as not being loyal to Islamic ideology and Arab world. And it diminishes the opportunity of SPLM flourishing and winning the heart of Islamists and Arab world. Where on the earth will the Arab accept a Christian ruling government to govern Islamic believers –great test for SPLM to challenge in the elections?
Having power is very tempting because it is like having the world at your hand, but one can not guess what will happen in the course of your governing. Power evolves especially to a party that is at its novice state of trying to show its political mechanism and intelligentsia in governing, proving and challenging their opponent that they are willing to rule by virtuous of equality, justice, and peacefulness- a charismatic approach to the Sudanese.
What is next for Northerners to learn?
What Northerners need to scrutinize is that nobody refuses unity, but the records and brutalities they have done in the past are tragic and horrifying to Southerners. Therefore, it is what goes around that will come to hurt them. Had northerners proved in the past by not being tyrannical and arabized the African Community; I think today nobody would have objected to unity. They need to know that incumbent dissatisfaction and outrageous continuity of power manipulation are the hot spot questions that need answers at hand. Sudan needs to transform its governing system from totalarianism to democratization where liberty, equality, accountability, transparency, and religious separation from state as well as enacting secularism are institutionally recognized.
However, the unity of Sudan is a hollow or hole that need patches like a torn cloth because of two reasons: the Islamic fundamentalism will not and will never be parted from the state’s constitution, and another reason is that Northerners are too manipulative to accept the reality of SPLM governing. Lastly, but not the least the incumbent president is not willing to give up power, especially with the looming of his indictment by ICC; Bashir will ensure that he stays in power to protect himself from indictment. Let SPLM not be cheated by two years in palace because referendum of 2011 is at the door. And let the Northerners not bailed unity on SPLM’s ruleship or count the chicks before they are hatched- a long way to compromise the deal.
Miyar De’Nyok is a student at the University of Waterloo majoring in Environmental resource and sustainable development
