Kitab Unango
Africa-Press – South-Sudan. The Sudanese interim government is seeking the assistance of President Salva Kiir to hold elections at the end of the transitional period to transform into a democratic state.
A leading member of the Sudan Sovereign Council, Bahri Muhandis Ibrahim, and the Sudanese Ambassador to South Sudan, Gamal Adelmageed Gassimel, led a delegation that met President Kiir last Friday to discuss the matter.
According to the information from the office of the president, along with bilateral cooperation between Juba and Khartoum, the delegation discussed post-conflict democratic transformation centred on conducting general elections.
Speaking to the press after the meeting, Sudanese Ambassador to South Sudan, Gamal Adelmageed Gassimel, said the meeting discussed the progress of the political process in Sudan, in which political leaders are building consensus leading to the conduct of democratic elections after the end of the transitional period,” noted the office of the president.
It further stated that: “the Undersecretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Mayen Dut, said the two countries discussed ways to strengthen bilateral cooperation, particularly on how South Sudan will continue to support the political process in Sudan.”
The end of the Sudanese transitional period still remains unclear. According to the deal between the sovereign council leaders and the civil population after the overthrow of Omar Hassan in October 2019, the transition was to end in 2022, but the subsequent installation of deposed Prime, Abdallah Hamdok, led to its extension to July 2023.
The extension was a result of the Juba Peace Agreement between the Sovereign Council and the Sudanese Revolutionary Front (SRF), a coalition of five armed groups led by El Hadi Idris in 2020.
However, Sudan’s interim government has since continued to face resistance from two civilian-led groups – Freedom and Change Alliance and Youth Resistant – both of which demand a fully- fledged civilian-led democratic government. The current regime of Abdel Fatah Al Burhan is also opposed by Abdel-Aziz Al-Hilu’s SPLM-N.
However, a source in Sudan has revealed that the Sovereign Council and Freedom and Change have agreed to sign a deal soon that will exclude the youth group and SPLM-N, meaning that the government continues to face resistance from non-signatories.
According to the source, the youth and SPLM-N have refused to be part of the intended agreement between the government and the Freedom and Change group because key demands, including justice for fallen demonstrators and the removal of former President Bashir, the military reforms, and the termination of the committee tasked with investigating the Bashir regime’s corruption, are yet to be met.
In 2019, President Kiir offered to mediate Sudan’s protracted war after failed attempts by foreign and regional. In 2020, the agreement was signed, resulting in a short-lived peace in Sudan when the leaders of the Military Sovereign Council took over.
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