South Sudan: after the signing of the agreement, many points in question
Peace in South Sudan is back on track.
This Sunday, August 5 in the evening, in Khartoum, the capital of neighboring Sudan, power and opposition signed an agreement on power-sharing and security.
This agreement includes the return of the main rebel leader Riek Machar.
A compromise that does not solve everything but is an important signal.
This agreement has the advantage of bringing everyone together. All opposition groups, even the most reluctant, have signed.
Participants share, by percentage, all posts at the level of the presidency, government, institutions and states since South Sudan has a federal system.
Salva Kiir will remain the president. Riek Machar becomes Senior Vice President. Four other vice-presidents will be appointed.
They will have 35 ministers, 550 deputies, and so on. The text also renews the commitment of the parties to respect the cease-fire, which is violated sporadically, but which, despite that, holds.
This was a forceps signature. A few hours before the ceremony, some groups still refused to participate. But the international pressure has been very strong. “The 2015 agreement was imposed on us and it collapsed. It will not fail,” said President Salva Kiir.
Many points remain to be settled
The future will tell. Moreover, this Monday morning, his opponent Riek Machar wrote on Twitter: “we do not say that a good peace has been signed. We say that even if some clauses are inappropriate, give the people space to breathe while we solve these problems.”
We are not saying that a good peace has been signed. We are saying that even if some clauses look inappropriate and uncompromising, let’s give our people a breathing space while we work through those loopholes. They’ve suffered too much.
— Dr Riek Machar Teny (@Drriekmachar) August 6, 2018
Negotiations must continue in Khartoum. There are still a lot of issues to be sorted out on the schedule, including the concrete application of the measures, and so on.
A few days ago, Salva Kiir had also asked: “the five vice-presidents need security, vehicles, housing, where will I find that?” He asked himself.
