S. Sudan Parties Hold Consultative Meeting on number of States their Boundaries
Ministers of IGAD member states and leaders of South Sudan Peace Agreement signatory parties meeting during a consultative meeting on November 9, 2019 in Addis Ababa (Photo: Supplied).
Dec 2nd, 2019 (SSNN)-The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) has brought together Parties to the R-ARCSS for a two-day consultative meeting on the number of States and their Boundaries, a critical pending task that has stalled the implementation of the peace agreement.
The Consultative Meeting of the Parties to the R-ARCSS on the number of States and their Boundaries held from 2nd will continue until 3rd December 2019 in the capital Juba and aims to find an amicable solution to this outstanding issue that currently impedes the formation of the Unity Government.
“During the High Level Revitalization Forum, one of the major sticking points was the number of states and their boundaries. Cognizant of this fact and with a view to avoid impasse in the peace negotiations, when the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) was signed on 12h September 2018, the mandate of finding a solution to the issue during the Pre- Transitional Period was given to the Technical Boundary Committee (TBC) and the Independent Boundaries Commission (IBC). In this regard, the TBC was mandated with the task of defining and demarcating the tribal areas of South Sudan as they stood on 1 January 1956 and the tribal areas in dispute in the country, and the IBC with considering the number of States of the Republic of South Sudan, their boundaries, the composition and restructuring of the Council of States and to make recommendations on the same,” the statement issued by the regional bloc, IGAD, partly reads.
“The TBC concluded its work and submitted its report in March 2019 wherein it recommended to the IBC that the tribal boundary disputes in the Republic of South Sudan is not a technical matter rather a political one and should be treated as such.”
The statement further added that, “The IBC also in its final report was unable to give recommendations on the number of States and their boundaries since the required number of South Sudanese votes were not secured for the decision to pass.”
“The IBC therefore recommended that IGAD should engage the Parties to find a political solution to the matter. In view of the above, the 69h Extraordinary Meeting of the IGAD Council of Ministers held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on 10th November 2019, directed the IGAD Special Envoy for South Sudan to, inter alia, facilitate a meeting of the Parties to the R – ARCSS to resolve the issue of the number of states and their boundaries and any other issues pertaining to the establishment of R-TGoNU It is against this backdrop that the IGAD Special Envoy for South Sudan is organizing a two-day Consultative Meeting of the Parties to the R-ARCSS in Juba, South Sudan, so as to provide the platform for the latter to dialogue and find a mutually agreed way forward with regard to the issue of the number of States and their Boundaries as well as the composition and restructuring of the Council of States.”
Facebook Comments