The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement in Opposition (SPLM-IO) has faulted the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) special envoy to South Sudan, Dr. Ismail Wais, for alleging that the party’s internal wrangles were weakening its grip as a peace partner.
The SPLM/A-IO’s rebuttal comes barely a couple of days after Dr. Wais said in an interview with Radio Miraya that the dispute within the main opposition party worked against its position in the implementation of the Revitalised Peace Agreement.
Wais said he had raised concerns to the guarantors to the 2018 peace accord and the chair of IGAD on the need to engage both sides of the splinter group of SPLM/A-IO, which encompass the Kit Gwang group and the SPLM/A-IO faction allied to the First Vice President Dr. Riek Machar.
“We have to engage the IO to clean their house and of course also to come back to their original strength. And, of course also…we tell them the more they split and fight among themselves, [the more this will] also weaken their position within the peace process,” he further added.
According to Dr. Wais, the SPLM/A-IO is a giant political outfit in the implementation of the peace agreement. It commands a bigger force and it would be detrimental to ignore its fissures.
“Something happened on the ground, and we need to know really what happened and what the cause of these. [We need to] talk to the people on both sides and find out how to engage them, but as I said from the very beginning: this is an internal IO dispute; it is a defection within the SPLM-IO and we have to also see this question as such,” Wais added.
Not really…
But in a quick rebuff to Dr. Wais’s remarks, the Director of Information in the Office of Dr. Riek Machar and the Acting Spokesperson of SPLM-IO, Puok Both Baluang, said the split did not affect the peace accord because Dr. Machar is committed to the course.
“First of all the SPLM/A-IO regrets to hear such statement from the guarantors of the peace agreement and we believe SPLM/A-IO is still strong and the defections that hit SPLM/A-IO is not a new thing,” Baluang said as he opposed Mr. Wais statement.
He said the defections within his party were not something new that could have a huge impact to weaken the party’s ability to implement the agreement up to the end of its tunnel in letter and spirit pointing out that those who defected are individuals.
“SPLM-IO is still strong and those who defected from IO are just individuals, they did not leave any impact on the movement and I want to assure Mr. Wais that SPLM/A-IO is still strong in different levels from the political side to the diplomatic side and the army on the ground,” he stated.
“That is why now JDB is forming committees to visit all the training centers to conduct the process of screening all the forces across South Sudan. We are strong, we are not weak to lead in the process of the implementation of the agreement” Baluang added.
Mr. Baluang accused the incumbent Transitional Government of National Unity (TGoNU) of fuelling the split within the SPLM/A-IO alleging that the peace partner “wants to weaken the SPLM/A-IO to disrupt the implementation of the agreement’’.
“Several times in different platforms, the R-TGoNU of the SPLM-IG is the one making or engineering defections for the aim of weakening the SPLM/A-IO…and we would like to assure the public that we are moving on to implement the agreement to reach its end call”.
But on the other hand, the SPLM-IG side has maintained innocence in the matter and at some point, President Salva Kiir convened a presidential meeting to iron out the differences within the opposition party.
Baluang welcomed the proposal by IGAD to launch an investigation into the defections of the Kitgwang group to find a solution.
He said Dr. Machar was briefed by IGAD about the investigation and that Machar’s faction is aware of the plan. He said they welcome back those who will divorce the Kitgwang group.
“We welcome that decision to go and investigate and to meet both parties: the SPLM/A-IO forces on the ground and the group of the defects so that we can reach the bottom of the conflict. But from our side, we welcome all the people that will decamp to the SPLM/A-IO,” he remarked.