Home News News The status of the South Sudan mediation process: Is a peaceful, long-lasting solution in sight? Share Bookmark Print Rating South Sudan President Salva Kiir (L) and (R) SPLM Opposition leader Riek Machar hold the hands of two clergymen during the opening prayer of the press conference of the signing of Cessation of Hostilities on May 9 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. AFP Photo South Sudan President Salva Kiir (L) and (R) SPLM Opposition leader Riek Machar hold the hands of two clergymen during the opening prayer of the press conference of the signing of Cessation of Hostilities on May 9 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. AFP Photo By JOHN GACHIE, Special Correspondent Posted Monday, July 7 2014 at 15:03 In Summary The process is beset by contradictions, obstacles, challenges and lack of commitment and trust by President Salva Kiir and Dr Riek Machar. SHARE THIS STORY 1 inShare For regional military and security experts, the current conflict in South Sudan did not come as a surprise. The signs were there; what was uncertain was when, how, or what would trigger the fighting and how the government of South Sudan would meet the challenge. Following the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement formally ending the war in January 2005, Dr John Garang was sworn in as the Vice President of the Republic of Sudan. After his death in a helicopter crash on July 30, 2005, Salva Kiir was chosen to succeed Dr Garang to the post of First Vice President of Sudan and President of Southern Sudan. However, President Kiir’s leadership of the Sudanese Peoples’ Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) was not guaranteed or secure within the top echelons of the party. Many people in the movement felt that President Kiir lacked the leadership skills and ability to hold the SPLM/A together, and check the ambitions of the top military commanders. President Kiir was perceived as “one among equals,” a temporary figure who could be edged out once the independent state of South Sudan was achieved. Then the long-simmering power struggle within the government exploded on December 15, 2013, in Juba, threatening to consume the entire region as the military disintegrated. The out-going head of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) and one of the key supporters and architects of the South Sudan peace agreement, Hilde Johnson, aptly captures the situation saying, “the signs, the tensions were all there; but above all, there was paralysis.” As the fighting raged, President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda dispatched his troops into the foray in support of President Kiir. Foreign nationals were evacuated, a safe corridor to the border with Uganda was created and the Juba airport was secured by Ugandan troops. READ: Uganda defends troop deployment In the meantime, the South Sudan rival faction troops engaged in bitter and vicious fighting that quickly took an ethnic turn, and the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army (SPLA) split into two factions. The military sector of South Sudan was allocated over 40 per cent of the country’s annual budget estimates for more than eight years on a standing parade figure of between 120,000 and 180,000 men that has disintegrated into rival factions. In the interim, the international community and in particular the African Union and the regional Inter-Governmental Authority and Development (Igad) have tried to mediate and negotiate a ceasefire in South Sudan without much success. As the mediation process between the government of South Sudan, led by President Kiir, and the rebels, led by his erstwhile vice-president Riek Machar, limps on in starts and fits the prospects for an enduring and lasting peaceful settlement to the conflict seems to be ebbing away.

South Sudan President Salva Kiir (L) and (R) SPLM Opposition leader Riek Machar hold the hands of two clergymen during the opening prayer of the press conference of the signing of Cessation of Hostilities on May 9 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. AFP Photo 

By JOHN GACHIE, Special Correspondent

In Summary

• The process is beset by contradictions, obstacles, challenges and lack of commitment and trust by President Salva Kiir and Dr Riek Machar.

For regional military and security experts, the current conflict in South Sudan did not come as a surprise. The signs were there; what was uncertain was when, how, or what would trigger the fighting and how the government of South Sudan would meet the challenge.

Following the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement formally ending the war in January 2005, Dr John Garang was sworn in as the Vice President of the Republic of Sudan.

After his death in a helicopter crash on July 30, 2005, Salva Kiir was chosen to succeed Dr Garang to the post of First Vice President of Sudan and President of Southern Sudan.

However, President Kiir’s leadership of the Sudanese Peoples’ Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) was not guaranteed or secure within the top echelons of the party.

Many people in the movement felt that President Kiir lacked the leadership skills and ability to hold the SPLM/A together, and check the ambitions of the top military commanders.

President Kiir was perceived as “one among equals,” a temporary figure who could be edged out once the independent state of South Sudan was achieved.

Then the long-simmering power struggle within the government exploded on December 15, 2013, in Juba, threatening to consume the entire region as the military disintegrated.

The out-going head of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) and one of the key supporters and architects of the South Sudan peace agreement, Hilde Johnson, aptly captures the situation saying, “the signs, the tensions were all there; but above all, there was paralysis.”

As the fighting raged, President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda dispatched his troops into the foray in support of President Kiir.

Foreign nationals were evacuated, a safe corridor to the border with Uganda was created and the Juba airport was secured by Ugandan troops.

READ: Uganda defends troop deployment

In the meantime, the South Sudan rival faction troops engaged in bitter and vicious fighting that quickly took an ethnic turn, and the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army (SPLA) split into two factions.

The military sector of South Sudan was allocated over 40 per cent of the country’s annual budget estimates for more than eight years on a standing parade figure of between 120,000 and 180,000 men that has disintegrated into rival factions.

In the interim, the international community and in particular the African Union and the regional Inter-Governmental Authority and Development (Igad) have tried to mediate and negotiate a ceasefire in South Sudan without much success.

As the mediation process between the government of South Sudan, led by President Kiir, and the rebels, led by his erstwhile vice-president Riek Machar, limps on in starts and fits the prospects for an enduring and lasting peaceful settlement to the conflict seems to be ebbing away.