POWER STRUNGLE WITHIN SPLM RULING PARTY
BY JUSTINE LUPAI ELIAS.
The power struggle between the leadership of Sudan's people Liberation Movement (SPLM) has intensified recently notably the difference between the president and his former deputy Dr Riek Machar who is also the deputy chairperson of Sudan people Liberation Army.
Since the President sacked Mr Machar and replaced him with James Wani Igga, the former speaker of the house, the two giants remained in loggerheads.
The matter got worse recently when the president was caught on camera stating that the party’s main political organs, the Political Bureaus [PB] and National Liberation council [NLC] have no more mandate to function because their mandates expired. And, very conveniently, the only departments that are left to operate are the office of the president and the secretarial, and he the President is the only person left with power to appoint caretaker committee until further notice essentially a rude awaking for anyone in doubt and denial that our president is now an absolute and a full fledged dictator, not only griping and reaching the lives of the entire nation, from corner to corner, from governorship to mere citizens but also, now of the sole national party, Alas he then has become the sole standing bull in the cattle camp.
This fact seemed to have prompted the former vice president Mr Machar to openly react to the president's unilateral moves, in his recent press conference in Juba, where the former vise president was vocal about what he declared, rightly so, the unconstitutionality of the president’s single handed management of the party without other SPLA/M party members.
During his recent press conference, in Juba. Mr Machar stated that in the meeting chaired by him as vice chair of SPLM party with majority of senior members of the political Bureau present, according to Mr Machar they were able to discuss important issues affecting the party, including the decision taken by president to dissolved the two organs of the ruling party. Mr Machar reacted strongly by saying SPLM chairman had violated and overstepped his constitutional boundaries. He further said the President has no right to dissolved the party's organs without consultation, and he Machar additionally warned that the majority members of the political Bureau would take action against Mr Kiir unless he reversed his decision.
This kind of unacceptable behavior of Kiir taking the country as his personal property is a clear act of flagrant dictatorship which has serious implications for our country’s stability, with possibilities of leading to more escalation of unrest, given specially that, elections fever is knocking at the doorstep of our Republic.
In my opinion we the citizens of this great country deserved to know what is happening in our country as it will affect the lives of every single one of us and our families thus one person can not take our lives in his hands. We are a nation striving for democracy and with many highly learned citizens in varied fields of academia, we don't want to see another repeat of the same scenario whereby the entire country is held hostage by one man as was in the former and current Sudan, in the former Libya, Iraq and current Zimbabwe. Haven’t we learned anything from these and many other disastrous path of a single man rule?
This ideology of centralized dynasty of one person making decision for the rest of us is an act that will suit the interest one person and his associates. The former Vice president, therefor, was within his right to questions such abuse of power by the president.
The attainment of South Sudan's independence was based on collective efforts from different people, and ethnic grouping than the daily rhetoric uttered in the streets of south Sudan that “ we are born to rule or we liberated this country”.
This misguided rhetoric should not be allowed to drag us into complete unrest and into another lost times for our peoples of this nation. South Sudan is neither Mr Kiir nor the acting general secretary of SPLA/M Dr Ann Itto. Mr Kiir dictatorial behavior must not be tolerated and he must not be left to decide singularly for all of us. We elected him and if he cannot set a good example of democracy as a president and cannot draw a clear road map to lead us till the next elections, then he has to relinquish power and if he refuses then he should be impeached. The politburo should convene the SPLA convention so that the leadership election should be held. Otherwise we the members of SPLA/M party will lose interest in SPLA/M as our solid party and begin to seek for other alternatives.
What is happening within the ruling party especially within the inner circle of Mr president will soon explode. It is very clear Mr Kiir and the generals who surrounded him want to buy more time to delay the convention of political Bureau for their personal gains.
For those who surround Kiir, what matters to them is their salaries and power not putting the interest of the country first. One of the reasons he is delaying the convention is, he Mr President is trying to avoid direct confrontation with his former vice President who had been critical about how he the President is driving our country. Secondly, Mr Kiir knows very well he may lose his legitimacy of holding onto power irreversibly, which is why he dreads to announce the date for convention. It is most likely Mr Machar would unseat the President from occupying the seat of SPLA/M and, if Mr Machar unseated the president, he the president would have no legitimacy to context in the coming elections. This is the core to this delay tactics of Mr Kiir. Simply put he is buying himself more time without holding the political Bureau convention until after the elections of 2015.
A well-calculated move, hoping that Mr Machar would be angered into taking an independent ticket, but it may looks like Machar has sense the danger of boarding on independent ticket.
If Machar were to decide to go on independent ticket the army would be use against him to intimidate and harass his supporters. And Machar seemed to have played his game very wisely and intelligently which speaks very well of him by remaining within SPLA party and advocating for the party’s constitutional approaches while quietly capitalizing on the president's mistakes. This has and will earn him considerable number of supporters within the senior members of Political Bureau and nationally. This will include people like the former South Sudan foreign Minister Mr Deng Alor, Luka Biong who was the pioneer of Abeyei referendum, Madam Rebecca Nyadenge just to mention some few.
It is lamentable that despite the numerous examples of democracies that thrive in the world and in Africa and the numerous help our country received at her birth, the foundation of this our nation was laid crooked and poorly. Right before its birth, our country has been crippled by the style of the president of “rule by decree” imbedded in the constitution that allows him free hand and absolute power to fire even governors who themselves were elected by the people just as was the president. The governors are employed and have contracts directly with the citizens, How can the president fire one he has no contract with? There is iniquity in our constitution engineered with and by corrupt minds that have now ran our country into abyss from which only we the citizens can save it.
The president, therefor, should not be allowed to mishandle and manhandled singlehandedly our party and nation. He must not get away with dictatorship. He must not be allowed to use our country as his personal milking cow. He, Kiir is not South Sudan and South Sudan is not Kiir and must be investigated for corruption scandals, suspicious killings and jailing without trials of citizens who are critics of his manner of governing and mismanagement of our resources. Should he instigate unrest in order to remain in power and result into lost of lives, all must be done to ensure he faces International court of Justice for until now, he has been and is above all and every law in the books of this great land, by design in keeping with their abominable "We liberated you and born to rule" Agenda.
Author
Justine Lupai Elias.
Calling sin by its true name.
Helsinki, Finland.
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