‘Church toiled for peace in South Sudan’

Fears of violence over the referendum on the secession of the Christian south of Sudan from the Arab-dominated Muslim north had not materialised as we went to press – and, as in South Africa’s bloodless ending of apartheid, the nation may have the church to thank.

Sudan, Africa’s largest nation, has witnessed two gory civil wars over religion, ethnicity and resources resulting in the death of an estimated 2.5 million people in the last five decades.

But as the historic moment came for the southerners to decide if they want to remain with Sudan or secede, Archbishop Daniel Deng Bul Yak said the choice was a real one.

‘There were only a few, isolated incidents of violence and that too not in the south,’ the Archbishop and Primate of the Province of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan told Lapido, speaking from the southern capital of Juba.

However, the church was not telling the people to vote for secession. ‘We have only educated the people about their democratic rights, without influencing their decision. They should make their own choices.’

The referendum is set to form the world’s youngest nation. An official from the UN Movement Control Officer in Sudan who did not want to be named said it was public knowledge that south Sudan wanted independence if given a chance, after the abject failure of the regime to invest the south’s oil wealth back into the south, and the literal enslavement of whole villages by Arab raiders.

Most roads in the south remain unchanged since the 1950s.  The infrastructure is pitiful.

The January 9 referendum is part of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) between the government of Khartoum and rebels from the south.

North-south differences widened in the early 1990s after the military government led by President Omar Hassan al-Bashir sought to enforce Sharia law in the predominantly Christian south.

‘Christians in the south are God-fearing, but they have been under severe pressure for over 55 years. They were traumatised, so peace and reconciliation were very important,’ said the Christian leader from Sudan’s largest church.

However, a peaceful referendum alone cannot solve Sudan’s multifaceted problems.

President Bashir has said that the north will have a stricter Sharia law if the south separates. This endangers the safety of over 2.5 million internally displaced people, mostly Christians from the south, languishing in the north.

‘We hope that all the people in the north will be treated as citizens, and not based on their religion,’ the Archbishop said. ‘As far as the church is concerned, there will be no division. There is one God and one Church. We will remain one with the church in the north,’ he added.

On Darfur in west Sudan, which too has been in a civil war for over seven years resulting in the death of over 400,000 people, the Archbishop said the church would ‘encourage the Christians there not to ask for independence, but to seek peace.’

It is feared that an independent south may revive tensions in Darfur.

A referendum was also to be held in the oil-rich Abyei region under the 2005 peace agreement. But the plebiscite in Abyei, which is claimed by both the north and the south, has been postponed due to lack of preparations and amid violence that began on Friday and had killed over 30 people at press time.

The violence in Abyei was allegedly led by Arab tribes believed to be supported by Khartoum.