A referendum polling center in Al Gezira state in northern Sudan. Photo: Mirella McCracken/USAID/flickr CC:BY.
Referendum result in Southern Sudan
Anthony Wilson remembers the Quaker involvement in an historic peace initiative in southern Sudan in 1973
In early January 2011 a referendum took place in Southern Sudan to determine whether the region should remain part of Sudan or become independent. The preliminary final results of the referendum have just been published and almost ninety-nine per cent (98.83%) voted in favour of independence. This July is the predetermined date for the creation of an independent state.
It is sad but sobering to realise that the referendum in South Sudan, as a prelude to its likely secession, with unforeseen consequences for the Sudan and all of Africa, need never have taken place if the Addis Ababa Accord of 1973 had been adhered to by the government of the Sudan. The Barrow Cadbury Fund, of which I was then secretary, financed first the meeting of scattered Anya-nya (Southern) leaders in exile to agree their political platform after seventeen years of conflict; and then their legal representation, by Dingle Foot, at the Addis Ababa conference which followed.
In a subsequent visit to South Sudan, I saw the reconciliation of the two armies being put into practical effect. My report to the new provisional government was able to point to the constitutional, legislative, political and administrative resources available to implement the new agreement, as well as the steps towards rural reconstruction that were within the capacity of the Juba administration.
The most striking image of the integration of the two armies was in the uniforms. Northerners are broad in the waist; Southerners well over six foot and thin. So the new trousers were gathered in folds round Southern waistlines, and reached just below their knees. When I travelled round the country in army convoys, the two sides shared trucks, but most of the space was taken up with their beds.
A peaceful settlement, with regional autonomy for the South within the Republic of the Sudan, was a good prospect until, ten years later, the president in Khartoum determined that the whole country should be subject to Sharia law – which would never be acceptable to the non-Islamic South. The civil war resumed, with hundreds of thousands of people killed and displaced. Let us hope that this settlement will benefit people who have lived through nearly sixty years of war, and that hopes will not be dashed for a second time.
