webmaster
© Copyright DEHAI-Eritrea OnLine, 1993-2010
All rights reserved
From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Thu Sep 02 2010 - 12:45:14 EDT
Sudan referendum body agrees post to end deadlock
Thu Sep 2, 2010 2:32pm GMT
* Sudan referendum commission agrees key post
* Dispute over post had paralysed commission
* Just four months until vote on independence
By Opheera McDoom
KHARTOUM, Sept 2 (Reuters) - Sudan's referendum commission agreed on a key
post on Thursday, ending a deadlock which has stalled plans for the Jan. 9
southern vote on independence from the north against which it has fought
decades of civil war.
The plebiscite is the climax of a 2005 north-south peace deal which ended
Africa's longest civil war.
But bickering over implementing the deal has fuelled mistrust and most
analysts believe the south, where most of Sudan's 6 billion proven oil
reserves lie, will secede.
Last month, south Sudan's ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement said it
would accept a northerner to take the post of secretary-general, ending a
row that had paralysed the nine-member commission's work. The
secretary-general is pivotal and controls the funds.
"We agreed - we had only one person that was brought this morning and we
agreed that he should be the secretary-general," commission member Lual
Chany told Reuters. Mohamed Osman al-Nujoomi had previously worked in the
finance ministry, he said. The president would appoint al-Nujoomi to the
post.
But the SPLM on Thursday accused the northern ruling National Congress Party
(NCP) of trying to derail the Jan. 9 deadline for the emotive vote.
Observers say a delay could spark violent protests by southerners throughout
Sudan.
"The NCP they have no political will to take decisions - they are buying
time...with committee after committee," said senior SPLM official Yasir
Arman. "The end game is for the referendum not to take place on time," he
said.
At least four committees are tackling sensitive post-referendum issues
including the division of oil wealth and defining citizenship but little
progress has been made.
The two party leaders President Omar Hassan al-Bashir and First Vice
President Salva Kiir have failed to agree on the disputed north-south border
or oil-producing Abyei region.
"The meetings of the presidency and of the committee they were not
fruitful," Arman said.
Arman said the NCP was funding the settlement of nomadic Arab Missiriya
tribesmen in the north in the Abyei region to change the demographic ahead
of any vote and urged the U.N. peacekeeping mission (UNMIS) to investigate.
UNMIS was not immediately available to comment.
Some 2 million people died in the civil war in which the mostly Christian
and animist SPLM rebels fought the Islamist Khartoum government over
ethnicity, ideology and oil.
(Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton)
C Thomson Reuters 2010 All rights reserved
INTERVIEW-Long road ahead for Sudan debt relief-World Bank
Thu Sep 2, 2010 9:37am GMT
* Sudan must broaden economy to stimulate growth
* Needs structural reform to be eligible for debt relief
* Sudan not on track to achieve MDGs
By Opheera McDoom
KHARTOUM, Sept 2 (Reuters) - Sudan needs structural reforms to broaden its
economy and encourage private business to reduce a 46 percent poverty rate
and qualify for relief on its $35 billion external debt, the World Bank's
vice president for Africa said on Thursday.
Obiageli Ezekwesili told Reuters in an interview that Sudan needs to work on
reducing poverty through small business and agricultural incentives and
developing infrastructure before it can qualify for relief on its debt.
"On the macro fiscal side of things you can't take it away from them that
they've actually done some interesting things," Ezekwesili said. "On the
structural reform side though they could do a whole lot more."
Since signing the peace deal in 2005 ending Africa's longest civil war,
which claimed 2 million lives, Sudan has asked for relief on its debt, which
makes Khartoum ineligible for major international loans.
Ezekwesili said Khartoum was not on track to achieve millennium development
goals set by the United Nations and must invest in health, education,
infrastructure, human development and agriculture to diversify its economy,
which depends on oil for 60 percent of its revenues.
Such investment was needed to accelerate any path to relief on Sudan's debt,
some of which was racked up by previous governments to propagate the north's
war against the south.
A co-founder of anti-corruption agency Transparency International,
Ezekwesili, a former government minister in Nigeria, said Sudan should also
work equally hard to encourage private local businesses as it did to attract
foreign investors.
"How easy is it for a private individual in Sudan to just set up a business
and thrive in that business without being tied up in all kinds of rules and
procedures?" she said. "How do you create an environment where the average
Sudanese wants to pull themselves out of poverty?"
The World Bank plays a lead role in determining how to spend $4 billion
pledged by donors to rebuild Sudan following the 2005 north-south peace
accord, although much of the aid was diverted to a humanitarian crisis in
Sudan's western Darfur region.
Ezekwesili said the economy's structure was hampering Sudan's ability to
meet UN millennium development goals (MDGs), which include eradicating
extreme poverty and hunger, providing universal primary education, reducing
child mortality and promoting gender equality by 2015.
"When you look at the poverty indicators in the country it's clear that the
structure of the economy has not enabled the MDGs to be positively on
track," she said.
The World Bank, donors and Sudan have jointly spent $414 million on
development projects throughout the country since the 2005 peace accord.
AID FOR SOUTH SUDAN
Ezekwesili said the World Bank and donors would likely develop a more
comprehensive approach for aid to develop semi-autonomous south Sudan, which
will vote on a referendum for independence in January. Most analysts believe
it will secede from the north.
"It will not just be a specific project kind of focus but to look at the
whole issue of an effective development strategy that enables the government
to prioritise broad-based economic growth and development," Ezekwesili said.
She said the focus in the south would be on building the government's
capacity and improving the efficiency of public spending.
The south's government is dominated by the former rebel Sudan People's
Liberation Movement, which is struggling to transform from a guerrilla
movement into a political party. The government has been plagued by
corruption and a lack of trained staff in the ministries after the civil war
which raged for all but a few years since 1955.
The government derives 98 percent of its revenues from oil in the south but
the refineries and port are in the north, which means some oil
revenue-sharing would probably continue even if the south secedes. (Editing
by Susan Fenton)
C Thomson Reuters 2010 All rights reserved
----[This List to be used for Eritrea Related News Only]----