Sudan - the largest country in Africa and one of the priority states of Slovak official development aid is preparing for an event that could change its map. Under the peace agreement that in 2005 ended more than 20 years of civil war between northern and southern Sudan, a referendum is to be held in January to decide on the division of the country. Although this would not be the first border change in Africa since the end of colonialism, the breakup of states and creation of new ones is never simple anywhere in the world.
Michael Dool, a teacher at a primary school in the South Sudanese village of Agangrial, proudly shows the “kingdom” where he lives and works. The compound of the eight-year primary school consists of several mud buildings with thatched roofs, a kitchen under a tree where porridge made from grain supplied by the UN World Food Programme is cooked on a fire, and a large parking area for bicycles. Many children come to it from several kilometres away.
About a thousand children attend the school, and not even a third of them are girls. The higher the grade, the fewer girls in the classes. Girls and women in the culture of the local pastoral Dinka tribe do not have an easy life. They have the highest value at bridewealth time—sometimes even hundreds of cattle—and then they become household labour. Michael, however, is determined that his daughter will receive an education and finish school, and that he will not force her into early marriage.
The porridge in the school kitchen is made from the last supplies. Michael says that if the headteacher does not quickly obtain and bring food from the provincial city of Rumbek to cover the next three months, many children will not come to school. “Children cannot focus on studying with empty stomachs,” Michael adds, and he clearly also does not eat three times a day. Malnutrition, which in neighboring Kenya or Uganda is no longer often seen, affects nearly every living being in South Sudan. Including these highly valued cattle.
Bringing food or anything else here is not easy either. From Agangrial to Rumbek it is only 70 kilometres, but even our small development missions to Slovak-supported projects took three hours in a good car. There are only a few kilometres of asphalt roads in all of South Sudan. Even the visit to schools in Agangrial, which operate with financial support from Slovakia, was uncertain until the last moment. Not only because of heavy rain, which threatens to bog down mainly heavy vehicles, but above all because of security. In the settlement’s surroundings, clashes between clans over cattle have flared up again. According to Michael, these clashes, as well as the previous long drought and the resulting hunger, are what people in Agangrial suffer from most.
Like many in South Sudan, he still hopes that the fights over cattle will stop and that the country will develop more, investing in education and agriculture when South Sudan becomes independent and governs itself. Although the problems of this poor country will not be solved right away.
South Sudan has roughly eight million inhabitants and an area 13 times larger than Slovakia. Even establishing order in an effort to stop clan violence in their fights over cattle will not be easy. And the problem is not only disarmament and internal disputes. After years of war, educated people and qualified labour are missing in all sectors—doctors, teachers, managers, and also trained bricklayers, electricians, carpenters, plumbers, who are often replaced by workers from Kenya and Uganda. Schools of all levels, textbooks, maintained wells, roads, electricity, and infrastructure are lacking. State and public administration are only forming, and even in the case of independence there is no guarantee that all oil profits will be invested in gradual development.
Despite this, Michael is determined and in the January referendum he will choose South Sudan’s independence without hesitation. The question is whether the referendum will happen, when it will happen, and whether the North will recognize its results.
The referendum on South Sudan’s self-determination is provided for by the agreement that in 2005 ended Africa’s longest civil war. The conflict between the predominantly Arab North and the Black South lasted, with breaks, almost continuously for the whole period since Sudan declared its independence. Two million people died and another four million had to flee their homes. What remained was a country among the poorest in the world, with incalculable economic and social losses linked to missing infrastructure and an educated population.
The peace agreement granted neglected South Sudan the right to self-determination and autonomy status. Under the agreement, the priority for both sides in the conflict is to preserve a joint state, while in the following transitional period they are to do everything so that the joint state becomes “attractive” to the residents of the south. Its attractiveness is to be shown in the referendum on South Sudan’s self-determination, which was supposed to be held in January 2011, half a year before the peace agreement expired.
A few months before the planned referendum, however, it seemed that the vision of a joint state did not attract people in South Sudan at all. Everyone we met on the way believed it would be better when they become independent. The reasons for independence were similar, and the elders from the settlement of Marial Lou summed them up during our joint meeting under a tree: Khartoum does not comply with the peace agreement—it keeps a larger share of the oil profits from oil mined in the south, treats southerners as second-class citizens or former slaves, did not help build schools, roads, wells or hospitals that are so badly needed. In their view, the government in Khartoum had enough time to show that it cared about the South, and if it is trying to do so now, it is too late. That is why they suspect it is trying to destabilize security in South Sudan so it can delay the referendum and is helping to arm groups that trigger clan clashes.
The feeling of injustice and resolve among the elders is so strong that in the event of a referendum delay or other complications they will not hesitate and will defend independence even with weapons in hand. If Khartoum delays the referendum, South Sudan will clearly try to declare independence even without a vote. In the context of a delay in the agreement on finalizing the exact border lines, around which oil deposits are located, this could mean a new conflict.
The conflict, however, will not affect only the elders who say they have war experience, but also the young boys with serious faces watching the meeting under the tree without a word, the girls and women who pump water from the well further away, or who till maize fields with tools similar to hoes. The conflict will hit the expanding school, which is attended by more and more children but also by adults who had no chance of education during the war. It will affect the local clinic, where doctors from Slovakia also work and where a wartime clinic became a functioning hospital where local people are taking charge of healthcare. Development in a country that has so far had only five years of peace to slowly start its development will be reversed again. Once again, nothing will be built and invested in agriculture, education...
Khartoum’s delay
The government in Khartoum has two major reasons for not rejoicing at a potential border change and for postponing the referendum. The first is oil, the revenue from which forms, according to Reuters, nearly half of the government budget in Khartoum and by estimate 98% of the budget of South Sudanese autonomy. Oil is mined mainly in the south, and other new deposits lie close to the still imprecisely defined borders. The issue of oil in an otherwise peaceful settlement of the state status would not theoretically have to be so complicated. Oil flows to refineries in the north and is exported through Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast, so the mutual dependency of north and south on oil extraction and export and a decent agreement could, according to Reuters, help prevent a new conflict in this case. Theoretically.
Khartoum has another reason for concern. South Sudanese independence could be only the beginning of a path to disintegration. Darfur could follow, or even earlier the federal parts South Kordofan and Blue Nile, which during the civil war stood on the side of the south. In addition, there is the specific border region of Abyei. The inhabitants of Abyei also, under the peace agreement, are to decide in a parallel referendum whether they want to keep their special status within the north or join the south. The referendum in Abyei faces an even greater risk of delay.
Possible solutions
For Sudan to arrive at a “civil divorce rather than civil war,” talks are needed. The African Union therefore set up a special panel, within which representatives of both Sudanese sides are preparing options for a post-referendum solution. The panel proposed four options: 1. the creation of two independent states with no mutual ties, 2. two states with a tighter framework of cooperation that would, for example, allow free movement of people and goods, 3. a confederation, 4. a common federal state and strict implementation of the peace agreement to correct the historical inequalities and injustices that led to war.
Given the desire for independence, which is strong among people in South Sudan and was supported by the official South Sudanese administration, a common state appears unlikely. In this situation, however, the worst development scenario threatens—postponement of the referendum, unilateral declaration of South Sudanese independence, and a new conflict over borders and oil. That is why the least painful option seems to be creating two states, at least initially with closer ties and cooperation. The north and south are linked not only by oil, but also by the waters of the Nile and also by the problem of hundreds of thousands of refugees from South Sudan who live in the north and neighboring states.
Administration in the early stages
Regardless of how the talks turn out, independence will mean greater demands on the South Sudanese government in Juba as well. The administration of the still autonomous state is, however, fragile as a result of prolonged war.
When we arrived at the regional office of the South Sudanese Ministry of Education for the Lakes area in Rumbek, the director general placed us in a small office with flaking plaster and basic equipment. Two tables covered with tablecloths with a few stacks of papers and a UNICEF calendar, one shelf with a few textbooks on display, a fan and a few chairs. No computer at all. The customs officials at passport control in Rumbek airport did not have one either, where the runway, like the local roads, has no asphalt.
A government representative listed the main problems of local education: buildings are missing—children study under trees, there are not enough qualified teachers, school supplies are lacking, money is lacking—the monthly budget for running schools is genuinely poor. He also believes that Khartoum does not give the South Sudanese government its full share of oil revenue. On the other hand, he says, the largest chunk of that money still remains with the oil companies. He thinks that if South Sudan becomes independent, it will negotiate better contracts with oil firms. What if they do not agree to the proposals? “Then we will tell them to mine oil somewhere else,” he concludes.
Even the upcoming negotiation of new oil extraction contracts suggests that South Sudan may get stuck in the resource-curse problem that analyst Paul Collier called the resource curse. It is linked to corruption, weaker pressure on the ruling elite for responsible budget spending, and the attempt to retain power at any cost. The trap can be avoided by transparency in selecting contractors, publishing the contracts that are signed and government spending.
Development aid
In a country where a large part of the population cannot read and write, and where even at elections literate assistants are needed, such as teacher Michael in Agangrial, effective public oversight cannot be expected at first. For that reason, educational projects of Slovak non-governmental organizations (eRko, SAVIO) are justified here. Local people and the administration also value support for the operation of rural hospitals and deployment of doctors (eRko, Vysoké školy sv. Alžbety, Trnavská univerzita). With SlovakAid funding, future technicians are being trained who will be able to care for the maintenance of solar systems and wells (eRko), a water network was built in the city of Nasir (ADRA), a mill and bakery were built (Nadácia Integra), and so on. (Overall, according to the Platform of Non-Governmental Development Organizations, in 2004-2009 projects in Sudan under the SlovakAid brand that contribute to achieving the UN development goals received over 1.4 million euros.)
Several donors provide aid to South Sudan: the UN, the World Bank, the EU, and the USA. This year the EU set aside 150 million euros from the European Development Fund to help mainly in South Sudan, Darfur and the border areas between north and south. These are additional funds to more than one billion euros that from 2003 the EU has provided to Sudan in humanitarian and development aid. More funds are also intended for referendum preparation, for which it will send observers if it receives an invitation.
In efforts to avoid conflict, the USA offered Khartoum a “carrot and stick.” If Khartoum does not obstruct the referendum and agreements on disputed issues, the USA will provide investment in agricultural development—which Sudan has depended on for years—and later in other sectors. If Khartoum ends the conflict in Darfur, the USA offers the restoration of diplomatic relations, debt forgiveness and removal of trade sanctions. In the opposite case, besides the UN arms embargo, the USA would propose new sanctions.
Khartoum rejected the threat of sanctions. Nevertheless, in September the meeting at the UN on Sudan with participation of the African Union and the World Bank was scheduled to include American President B. Obama as well. The worsening situation in the country, which the USA placed on the list of state supporters of terrorism in 1993, threatens stability and security not only in East Africa.
It is welcome that, as the number of priority countries of Slovak official development assistance has been reduced, Sudan remained a priority this year. Complications in the country should not be a reason to retreat from support to South Sudan; rather the opposite.
Author: Daniela Balážová The article appeared in the journal Zahraničná politika, which is published by the Slovak Society for Foreign Affairs (RC SFPA, http://www.sfpa.sk ) http://www.zahranicnapolitika.sk