SOUTH SUDAN OPPOSITION ALLIANCE (SSOA)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date: 26th July 2018 Contact: Kwaje Lasu
+1-336-575-5965 (Direct/WhatsApp)
Email: jointoppositionpressrelease@gmail.com
Press Statement
Yesterday, the 25th of July 2018, we issued a press release explaining our position on the “Agreement on Outstanding Issues of Governance” and why we decided not to append our signature to it. We delivered our concerns in writing that morning to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Sudan who doubles as the Chief Mediator. Only close to the time of signing in the afternoon that he met us. Our advice to him was either to give more time for the Parties to discuss the objectionable points or remove the contentious issues from the draft agreement altogether, especially Paragraph 4 on the number and boundaries of the States, in order to subject them to further negotiations and the Parties proceed to sign the other five (5) paragraphs. The Minister could not agree to any of the two options and asked us instead to sign with reservations. We found his suggestion unacceptable and we agreed to disagree. Therefore, SSOA did not initial the document.
During the signing ceremony, one member of SSOA signed the document and he said that it was the Mediators who made him to sign at the space allocated to SSOA. Whereas we have no problem in any of the members signing against the name of his organization if it so chooses, signing against the name of SSOA is unacceptable and those who do so and the ones directing such breach stand to be condemned. This is the more distasteful because it came after we had informed the Mediation earlier that SSOA always signs as individual members as was the case in Addis Ababa and here in Khartoum regarding agreement on the Security Arrangements. The insistence of the Mediation to lump its members together in signing the document sends a signal of bad faith in light of what took place yesterday at the signing ceremony.
We wrote an official letter of protest to the Mediators and have taken disciplinary measures against the member that contravened our Charter by acting contrary to SSOA’s agreed position.
We assure our members and the public at large that SSOA will as always stand tall in the defence of the rights of our suffering people and shall never abandon their cause whatever the circumstances will be.
United we stand, divided we fall.
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