The Politics of Panic in Southern Sudan

By: Prof. Wani Tombe

The population census saga within the framework of the government of southern Sudan (GoSS); is very painfully amusing and embarrassing. The Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement (SPLM) politicians in both the GoSS and the government of national unity (GoNU);  appear to be operating under a tremendous weight of political confusion and uncertainty.
The public does not know who is in charge of the GoSS. The GoSS looks like an institution which is being governed; and managed by human impulse; devoid of any systemic prudence; appropriate for governmental management.

The political; and administrative vacillation over the census issue; and the rather unfounded reasons for the purported cancellation of the enumeration process in the southern Sudan; have put the integrity of the GoSS in serious disrepute.

The veracity of the argument presented by the GoSS; as the justification for its actions over this matter, cast serious political doubt over the ability of the President of the GoSS; vis-ˆ-vis his political control of the GoSS.

The GoSS ministers appear to have turned into run-away political juggernauts. Even state governors in the southern Sudan are reported to have defied the instructions of the President of the GoSS. Something is seriously wrong in the southern Sudan .

The GoSS must stop sentimentalising every political decision that they find difficult to deal with. The use of public emotions for managing the southern Sudan is counter-productive and exploitative.
The southern Sudanese are turned into captive audiences that do not question the actions of the GoSS. The use of history to permanently solve contemporary problems is very deceitful; misleading; and politically unfair; vis-ˆ-vis the people of southern Sudan .
Contemporary difficulties must not be found causes in the political history of southern Sudan . There are particular instances when we can use history for clarifying certain issues; but not all the time. That amounts to historical reductionism; and political expediency; and callousness.
The dressing up of group, and personal socio-tribal motives; in political effigies; and then; presenting them as political facts; with profound implications; for the implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) is wasting our political time; and portraying us southern Sudanese as a bunch of political idiots.

No; southern Sudanese are not in fact a bunch of political idiots. They are very clever people; but for their government that always turn their political position into political farce.
The political competition within the SPLM is turning into a political panic that is very embarrassing to the people of southern Sudan . The southern Sudanese ought to begin thinking seriously about changing these individuals who selected themselves as their rulers in southern Sudan .
These people are nothing but political failures; and political upstarts; whose places ought to be found somewhere in the various formations in the southern Sudan . The SPLM's politics of personality cult are ruining the southern Sudanese image in the eyes of the world.