From: Biniam Tekle (biniamt@dehai.org)
Date: Wed Jul 14 2010 - 13:42:20 EDT
http://www.economist.com/blogs/baobab/2010/07/south_sudans_independence
Breaking cover for independence
Jul 14th 2010, 15:59 by R.C. | LONDON
FOR the first time, some of the leaders of South Sudan have openly called
for independence in a referendum due to be held in January next year.
The leaders in question are not, admittedly, the politicians of the
governing Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM). But they are the next
best thing, the region’s church leaders. In a part of the world where an
overwhelming majority of people are probably devout Christians of one
denomination or another, the various Catholic, Episcopalian and other faith
leaders of the Sudanese Religious Leaders Referendum Initiative are
extremely influential. So for them to urge people to vote Yes to secession
from the north is significant, and should have a powerful effect on their
assorted flocks.
The SPLM are bound anyway by the terms of a 2005 peace deal not to openly
campaign one way or another; theoretically, the “people” are supposed to
decide this for themselves. In fact, I suspect that most of the SPLM’s
leaders themselves gave up on the idea of keeping Sudan together long ago
too. Some of them might even speak up in favour of independence over the
course of the next few months.
The church leaders sounding off like this reaffirms my belief that
southerners will vote for independence next year by a wide margin, thus
ushering in the creation of Africa’s first new state since Eritrea in the
early 1990s. That will be good for the southern Sudanese, who have endured
almost half a century of misrule and oppression by the Muslim northern
Sudanese regimes ruling from Khartoum.
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