SPLM/A parliament ratifies southern peace agreement

The National Liberation Council, the southern Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army's (SPLM/A) legislative body, on Monday unanimously ratified the southern peace agreement ending the 21-year civil war in the south. Members of the 224-seat Council convened in Rumbek, the provisional capital of southern Sudan, to discuss the requirements of the agreement, signed on 9 January by the Sudanese government and the SPLM/A in Nairobi, Kenya. "It didn't take the members of the National Liberation Council much time in order for them to ratify the agreement," Yassir Arman, spokesperson of the SPLM/A, told IRIN on Tuesday. "As some delegates were part of the negotiating team, the Council was already intimately aware of the details of the peace agreement," he added. Delegates were particularly concerned about the large number of Muslim countries that had offered to contribute forces to a future peacekeeping mission, fearing a northern bias during the implementation of the peace agreement in the south. Although the peace deal ends the application of Islamic Sharia law in the southern region, it was criticised for its perceived failure to lift Sharia from the Khartoum region. Members also asked questions about the division of wealth between the north and south, and the structure of a new government, but proposed no amendments to the accord. "That the peace agreement was widely and gratefully received by the population of Sudan, whom the Council is representing, was a clear indication that the peace deal was going to be ratified," Arman noted. Under the power-sharing agreement between the government of Sudan and the SPLM/A, 52 percent of the government will be from the ruling National Congress Party and 28 percent from the SPLM/A, with other northern parties taking 14 percent and other southerners six percent. The government, too, had started preparations for the implementation of the provisions of the comprehensive peace agreement. According to the official Sudan News Agency, foreign relations minister, Mustafa Uthman Isma'il announced on Monday that offshoot committees to the Peace Higher Committee, which is headed by President Umar al-Bashir, were established to study the various aspects of the agreement. For the peace agreement to enter into force, Sudan's national parliament has to endorse the agreement as well. The National Assembly is expected to start deliberations in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, on Saturday. Ratification will clear the way for the drafting of a new constitution and formation of a new national government. After six years, a referendum among the southern states will determine whether the south will become fully independent or remain part of a unified Sudan. The war between the SPLM/A and the Sudanese government in the south erupted in 1983 when rebels took up arms against authorities based in the north to demand greater autonomy. The fighting has killed at least two million people, uprooted four million more and forced some 600,000 to flee to neighbouring countries.