A group allied to the Fourth Vice President Taban Deng Gai has protested what it terms as total exclusion from the government appointments invoked by the presidential decrees.

Addressing journalists outside the premises of Parliament in Juba on Tuesday, February 23, the members of SPLM/A-IO said the precedent set in recent appointments could be a ploy to phase them out of leadership despite being part of the peace deal.

“We have learnt that our group has not been represented in the state government especially in the Central Equatoria government, the Northern Bhar el Gazal, Unity, Warrap that was decreed few days ago,’’ stated Bor Gathwech Kuany, a member the defunct outfit who was reading the petition on behalf of the colleagues.

“This shocked us. We couldn’t believe that we could be lifted out from this revitalised government of South Sudan because we are part of the agreement and part of the Interim TGoNU.’’

Chapter 1.3.1.1 of the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan [R-ARCSS] stipulates that the R-TGoNU shall be composed of the ‘Incumbent TGoNU, comprising, the former GRSS; the former SPLM-IO [Led by Gen. Taban Deng Gai] and the other political parties in TGoNU represented as such at the High Level Revitalised Forum.’

The parties to the 2018 peace deal were SPLM/A-IO, the South Sudan Opposition Alliances (SSOA), Former Detainees (FDs), and the other political parties outside Incumbent TGoNU such as the HLRF.

“As clear as it is in the agreement, we are supposed to have a representation at every level of the government. This shouldn’t be confused with the reunification process of the SPLM as a party because if you go to the agreement you will find that the SPLM as a party is not in the agreement.’’

The contentious issues

Kuany argued that the rules that ratified the inclusion of the SPLM/A-IO in the deal ought to continue because the members are still part and parcel of this deal. According to him, there is no single day that they renounced RTGoNU arrangement.  

“Those factions should continue to be represented in the government [as was] in the first agreement. We were represented because we were SPLM-IO and in this agreement we should also be represented because we are part of the Incumbent Transitional Government of the National Unity,’’ he assuredly said.

“For this reason, we are calling for these processes to be stopped. We are appealing to the president to stop this process so that our share in the government is included before going forward with the rest of the formation of the government in the states, or even the parliament.”

More claims

The group further claimed that they received a document presented to the president regarding on how the parliament would be reconstituted.

According Taban’s group, the document was presented by the acting Secretary General of the SPLM Jema Nunu Nkumba, and that the document presented how the positions in the next parliament would be allocated.

In the alleged document, the group said 165 seats for those elected to National Legislative Assembly in Juba would be maintained.  Also, 91 seats for those elected to the Legislative Assembly in Khartoum before independence in 2010 would be maintained. 47 representations to the National Legislative Assembly as in 2011 would also be maintained.  The team also alleged that the total number of seats for the SPLM alone would be 303 out of 332- leaving only 29 seats for other parties in the TGoNU.

He continued that out of the 29 seats, 10 would be allocated to some members appointed in 2010 leaving only 19 seats for those who were appointed in 2016.

Kuan said, “If the formula of the acting general is followed, it means that the majority of the 68 presidential appointees in 2016 who most of them were from the former SPLM/A-IO of General Taban which joined the SPLM will have been excluded.”