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Is Reactive Advocacy Enough? Looking Ahead to a 2011 Referendum in South Sudan

In Sudan, the cracks in the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement are starting to show, as the Government of Southern Sudan’s tenuous relationship with Khartoum struggles to stay in tact. Advocates have been astute in highlighting perhaps the greatest challenge to the CPA—the contestation over land in Abyei. The concept of this fragile peace is buttressed on the prospects for a 2011 referendum, allowing for South Sudanese to decide whether they will obtain autonomous statehood. Stakeholders, understandably focused on the immediate challenges inherent to the CPA, must highlight to the citizens of South Sudan, and to the international community, the risks and opportunities associated with independence, and even take a stance on the possible outcomes. Dividing North and South Sudan would leave an independent South in a fragile condition with limited prospects for long-term peace and development.

Juba, capital of Southern Sudan, is a growing hub for international investors, and calls to mind images of dusty gold mining towns of the late 19h century American frontier. Whilst public works are scarce, business thrives, and one struggles to find a tent for under $100USD per night as the influx of capital keeps prices for short-term accommodation high. If infrastructure is limited in Juba, outside this center, it is virtually non-existent. In Western Bahr al Ghazal state, Wau, the second most populous city in South Sudan with 200,000 people, has no electricity or networked water and sanitation system (though the Egyptian government has erected poles for electricity in recent months). Ministries such as that for health, while existent, literally have no budget, and though aid agencies abound, their works are often piecemeal and fragmented. The wealth captured through investment in Juba has not arrived in Wau.

Compounding the issues of limited resources and lack of redistribution is the prevalence of divisive ethnic identification in Western Bahr al Ghazal. Ethnicity is not as straight forward as Arab North and Christian South. Rather South Sudan is comprised of over 400 different ethnic groups and sub-groups. To some extent, these divergences were unified during the civil war against a common Northern enemy. However, as peace is restored to the South and investment barrels forward in Juba, if little of these resources are vested in service of communities outside the capital, increased polarization around identity will become a heightened issue in these areas. Other states in Africa and elsewhere in the world have seen a return to ethnic identification when faced with perceived grave structural inequity, as was the case in Rwanda and the Former Yugoslavia, and is now cropping up in post-election Western Kenya, to name but a few instances.

Further, clearly the issue of demarcating a line between Northern and Southern territory, as is required of the Abyei Boundary Commission, is vital to long-term peace in the region. The outcome of this process will determine the resource capacity and limitations for both South and North, and many authors have been active in pointing out the need for this process to be completed.

Given South Sudan’s economic and political situation, advocacy practitioners must look forward to 2011 and take a view on the possible outcomes of this landmark referendum. Further, positing alternative constructions for the Sudanese state is a vital role the international community is able to play. Presently, census data in Southern Sudan is at the early stages of collection. There are three years of preparatory time to educate voters and policymakers alike. Neutrality around this issue may prove to be vastly detrimental to South Sudan. Limited in natural resources, landlocked, with potential oil revenues (though not decidedly Southern) centered on Juba, and with such a myriad of ethnic compositions, the capacity for a separate South Sudan to develop and to maintain peace is nil. Given this information, investigation must be made into other potential solutions, including appropriately constructed confederated units, improved revenue redistribution mechanisms, and advancement in infrastructure grids for a unified Sudan.

Advocacy agencies have an advantage and a responsibility. They have the capacity to disseminate information on many levels. Improving international pressure to re-assess this issue, and enhancing local education about the realities of this decision, while there is still time to formulate long-term perspective, is a crucial role that these institutions can play to proactively engage in the South Sudanese dialogue.