Articles and Analysies
Would Sudan’s inflexible National Congress Party (NCP) honour a World Court Verdict on Abyei,? By Peter Lokarlo Marsu- Melbourne
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Jun 25, 2008 - 9:12:25 AM

Would Sudan ’s inflexible National Congress Party (NCP) honour a World Court Verdict on Abyei,?

However intricate the age-old and litigious question of Abyei may be, the genuine panacea resides solely in the pages of the ornately documented Abyei Border Commission (ABC) report, which was primed by a panel of international experts in line with the stipulation of the 2005 Sudan ’s Peace Agreement that ended the two-decade long civil war in the country. Sudan ’s inflexible and tetchy National Congress Party (NCP) had long repudiated and blatantly refused to honour the ABC document, insisting and flimsily arguing that the syndicate had exceeded their mandate in producing the report. The obdurate NCP stalwarts now believe that they will triumph and clutch Abyei through a Court sanction. This appears to be an erroneous assumption, as Khartoum does not possess convincing claim and argument on Abyei.

Certainly The Hague-based Court would not start from zilch; it would set off from the ABC report that could authentically constitute a functional and constructive launch pad for the World Court to pull off its work, but would the intractable National Congress Party in Sudan honour any Court’s verdict arrived at? I hope that Abyei is not Kashmir of Sudan in the making as it is widely perceived by political analysts.  Admittedly, Khartoum ’s track record of intractability in matters pertaining to acknowledgement and respect for international opinion is sadly awful and is incontestably incomparable or unrivalled in Africa . The NCP posse must understand that the patience and equanimity of the World Community have been well abused and overstretched to the point that international resentment is now mounting against them and their abhorrent policies and practices in Sudan .

If the World court adopts the recommendations contained in the ABC report, as it clearly seems to be, then the will of the Court must prevail and President AL Bashir and Company must comply with the decision and directives of the Court. There is scarcely any point in issuing a non-binding Court ruling lest the Court runs the risk of compromising its high moral ground.

Albeit it seems quite unlikely, a sizable segment of Southern public opinion is uneasy about the prospects of forfeiting their ancestral territory and that the NCP might adroitly manoeuvre their way to influence the Court’s Ruling in Khartoum ’s favour, given their (NCP) sordid record of underarm dealings, especially with countries that wield abundant political clout on the international showground. With copious military and political backing from those countries, the NCP has been emboldened to disregard international appeals and normally conduct their ghastly affairs in Sudan in a nonconformist mode. A case in point is the refusal of President Al Bashir to hand over the Darfur criminal suspects to the International Criminal Court in The Hague in pursuant to the UN Security Council Resolution 1593. Those two key suspects who were long expected to show up at The Hague for trial on their part in sanctioning rape bender, maiming and mass extrajudicial murders at the behest of the National Congress Party have not been arrested and handed over to the International Criminal Court (ICC) by the Authorities in Khartoum, despite repeated appeals by the former to do so. Ironically Ahmed Haroun one of the key suspects has been liberally rewarded President Al Bashir for executing Khartoum ’s loathsome policy in Darfur . Ahmed Haroun was elevated to become Sudan ’s Minister for Humanitarian Affairs.

Another worrisome scenario is that The NCP is monomaniacally bent on holding the Ugandan notorious and blood-thirsty rebels, the LRA hostage in a bid to fan flames of instability in South Sudan . It would be extremely hard for Sudan to remain united if the NCP holds an olive branch in one hand and a dagger in the other. Unity of the country hinges very much on the conduct of the NCP. They must put the interest of the country above Party gains. To date the so called Lord’s Resistance Army bandits with covert and bountiful backing from the National Congress Party, have persistently conducted unrestrained extravaganza of killings and rapes across the board in Eastern, Central and Western Equatoria States of South Sudan, inflicting monumental and incalculable damage on the people and the government of South Sudan that the NCP does not want to exist.

As the NCP has recognized the jurisdiction of the World court, it should likewise respect its ruling, and no one this time would be prepared to be told by the NCP that The Hague had exceeded its mandate.

Peter Lokarlo Marsu

Melbourne

Australia .