Africa-Press – South-Sudan. President Salva Kiir has blocked a proposed visit by former Vice President Riek Machar to Western Bahr el Ghazal state’s capital Wau, citing IGAD restrictions, a senior member of the main armed opposition group, SPLM-IO, said yesterday.
Machar, who is the leader of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-In Opposition, was invited by the Governor Sarah Cleto Rial to attend a conference to discuss the relocation of Wau County headquarters from Wau town to Baggari Payam.
However, SPLM-IO Director of Information and Public Relations Puok Both Baluang said in an interview with Radio Tamazuj yesterday that Kiir informed the governor that Machar could not attend the conference because he is still under IGAD detention.
“So, when the state governor met the president to extend him the invitation, the president declined and said he would not be able to attend the conference and the president informed the governor that Dr.
Riek Machar also cannot attend the conference in Wau because there are directives from IGAD that Machar is still under confinement,” he said. “The president did not tell us exactly whether there was another letter written by IGAD on the matter or it was just communicated verbally to him by IGAD,” he added.
Baluang who is also the acting press secretary for the first vice president Baluang said Machar has been receiving invitations from foreign countries among which is Egypt.
The official said that all the requests made by Machar to allow him travel were turned down by the president. “We have been receiving invitations for Dr.
Machar to travel abroad and the most recent invitation was from Egypt. Dr. Machar was invited to travel and attend a conference there and after last year’s Governors’ Forum, there was another invitation extended to Dr.
Machar by one of the West African countries to attend a meeting,” he said. “But those invitations were not given the go-ahead, and the president’s office went silent.
There was no response from the president because if a vice president or a minister is travelling, he or she first gets approval from the president,” he added. Machar was detained by the IGAD in South Africa for two years in 2016.
In 2018, the IGAD restrictions against Machar were lifted to allow him participate in the negotiations of the revitalized peace agreement which paved way for end of the conflict in September that year.
The IGAD in 2020 said that Machar was no under any restrictions, but the opposition leader has not been allowed to travel to states or his constituency.
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