On December 15, around 10
PM, heavy gun fire clashes between the South Sudanese presidential
guards were reported in the capital Juba. The national TV went off air,
and the airport was closed. The following day, President Salva Kiir
appeared in full military attire in a press conference and accused the
former vice president Riek Machar of leading a failed coup.
The death of several hundreds
in few days and the attacks on UN soldiers forced international and
regional mediators to intervene in an attempt to prevent this political
tension from escalating into a civil war. As negotiations are being
arranged, several questions need answers: Are the factors behind this
crisis purely political? How mature is the country’s leadership? And how
fragile is this nascent nation? In fact, several questions will remain
unanswered.
Machar was in the lead, and along with his colleagues he declared a rally to take place few days later. As party seniors invited Machar and his colleagues for an internal dialogue with Kiir during the National Liberation Council (“NLC”) event, the rally was postponed. Bishops and sheikhs gave the opening speech of the NLC reminding all the leaders in the room that discussion was the wise way to solve problems.
But apparently this did not calm the brewing anger. After the first day of the NLC meetings, and specifically on December 14, Machar declared he was pulling out of the meeting and invited his colleagues to do the same.
Last July, Machar was sacked from his position as a vice president, but remained serving as the vice chairman of the ruling SPLM. Commenting on his dismissal with a smile, he declared he will run against President Kiir for his positions as chairman of the SPLM and as president of the Republic.
Machar was not the only challenger to Kiir’s leadership. Pagan Amum, the former secretary-general of SPLM, who was sacked at the same time as Machar, also declared he would run for president in the 2015 elections. Amum was later subject to an internal SPLM investigation and was dismissed from the party – a decision which incited much criticism about Kiir.
Both men had a habit of openly criticizing Kiir’s decisions even when they still served in office. But after their dismissal, they waged a campaign against the SPLM’s leader, calling for internal reform and describing him as an undemocratic president.
In a mosaic society like South Sudan, politics is never the sole motive behind power struggles......Read More
http://globalriskinsights.com/2014/01/08/south-sudans-crisis-is-far-beyond-a-power-struggle/
