Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
06KHARTOUM1515
2006-06-27 15:15:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Khartoum
Cable title:  

SPLA SECRETARY-GENERAL SEES CRISIS BREWING IN

Tags:  PGOV PREL PHUM PINR SU 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO7194
PP RUEHROV
DE RUEHKH #1515/01 1781515
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 271515Z JUN 06 ZDK AS REQUESTED
FM AMEMBASSY KHARTOUM
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 3438
INFO RUCNIAD/IGAD COLLECTIVE
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KHARTOUM 001515 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR D, AF A/S FRAZER, AF/SPG, AND S/P (JAMES)
NSC FOR COURVILLE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/27/2011
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM PINR SU
SUBJECT: SPLA SECRETARY-GENERAL SEES CRISIS BREWING IN
SOUTH; NCP INFIGHTING CRITICAL

Classified By: CHARGE D'AFFAIRES CAMERON HUME; REASON: 1.4 (B) AND (D)

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KHARTOUM 001515

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR D, AF A/S FRAZER, AF/SPG, AND S/P (JAMES)
NSC FOR COURVILLE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/27/2011
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM PINR SU
SUBJECT: SPLA SECRETARY-GENERAL SEES CRISIS BREWING IN
SOUTH; NCP INFIGHTING CRITICAL

Classified By: CHARGE D'AFFAIRES CAMERON HUME; REASON: 1.4 (B) AND (D)


1. (C) Summary: The National Congress Party has lost the
political will to implement the Comprehensive Peace
Agreement, while the Sudan People's Liberation Movement lacks
the capacity to deliver a peace dividend, SPLM/A
S ecretary-General Pagan Amum told the Charge on June 23.
Though a crisis in the South was not imminent, it was
brewing. The international community was distracted by
Darfur, and was no longer engaged in the North-South peace
process. Worse, the NCP was preoccupied with maintaining its
own power -- even if meant destroying the Sudanese state.
Though the NCP might be persuaded to accept democratic
politics, much depended on a the relationship between
President Bashir and Vice President Taha. International
pressure could be helpful, but only if it gave Bashir a real
choice and showed him a way out. End Summary.

The SPLA's Metternich -- Sort Of
--------------


2. (C) Pagan Amum Okech is part Marxist theoretician, part
guerrilla commander, and part urbane diplomatist. The
fortysomething Shilluk tribesman from Malakal, in South
Sudan's Upper Nile State, made his first foray into politics
in 1982, when he led a group of Sudanese dissidents to exile
in Mengistu's Ethiopia. He later joined John Garang's
nascent Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A),and
spent two years "training" in Cuba. After serving in various
military and administrative posts, he emerged as the SPLM/A's
chief spokesman in 1994, and became its Secretary for Trade
and Humanitarian Aid in 1998. He was also one of SPLM/A's
chief negotiators -- perhaps even the key negotiator -- of
the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA). After years of life
in the jungle, Amum is now back in Juba, serving as SPLM/A's
first Secretary-General, and trying to transform a rebel
military organization into a democratic political party.
"I've been living in the world's most expensive IDP camp for

the past year," Amum joked, as he welcomed CDA Hume to his
new apartment. "It's nice to sleep in something besides a
tent."

NCP Losing Political Will, SPLA Lacking Capacity
-------------- ---


3. (C) He is not optimistic about the future of the CPA.
Though he recognized that things tended to move slowly in
Sudan, Amum believes the National Congress Party (NCP) had
lost the political will to implement the agreement. There
were differences about the oil transfer accounts. The
Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) had destroyed barracks and other
facilities while redeploying, to deny them to the SPLA. SAF
intelligence continued to support other armed groups in the
South, like the Lord's Resistance Army. The police remained
highly militarized, the elections commission was not yet in
place, and restrictions on democratic parties were still on
the books. "There is more freedom, to be sure, but there is
still an air of totalitarianism," he said quietly.


4. (C) There were problems within the SPLA as well. The
Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) lacks the capacity to
deliver a peace dividend; there were still no new schools,
roads, or medical facilities. Social services in the South
were worse than before the CPA, he argued, while GoSS
ministers and SPLM members drove around in new Toyota Land
Cruisers. Public opinion was not favorable, he admitted.
"This highly bureaucratic SPLM and GoSS cannot survive."
Amum had urged GoSS ministers to come forward with
"deliverables" -- quick impact projects -- that could be put
in place before the end of 2006, and bolster the Government's
legitimacy. He also believed the GoSS also had to engage the
World Bank, with an eye towards long term development. "The
NCP has given us an easy ride, because we can always blame
them. But we have to turn things around ourselves."


5. (C) Though Amum cautioned that he was not expecting a
crisis "tomorrow morning," he did see a crisis brewing. The
international community was distracted by Darfur --
justifiably, he acknowledged -- but the lack of international
involvement in the North-South peace process was forcing the
NCP and SPLM to try to solve their differences on their own.
Neither party, however, was accustomed to solving disputes
through political dialogue. "The likelihood of renewed civil
war is increasing, just as the likelihood of CPA
implementation is decreasing," he reasoned. The
international community needed to press both sides to get
progress.


KHARTOUM 00001515 002 OF 002


The NCP's Sucidial Strategy; Bashir vs. Taha
--------------


6. (C) Divisions within in NCP made this process even harder.
Few in the NCP really favored the CPA, Amum believed; most
were "locked into a mindset that would lead to the collapse
of the Sudanese state on top of the Sudanese people." In
reality, Amum said, Sudan is a failed state, but one that
remains somewhat functional. It was like a house that is on
the verge of falling apart: when one corner of the roof
falls in, everyone runs to another corner. But as soon the
roof is fixed, another corner falls in, and people run
someplace else. The NCP understands this reality, Amum said,
but instead of attempting to repair the house, they actually
want it to fall down. "The NCP thinks if it retains control
of the Nile Valley -- a triangle from Dongola, to Sennar, to
El Obeid -- it can wait while the rest of the country -- the
South, Darfur, and the East -- falls into complete disorder.
After that, the international community will ask the NCP to
police these areas; the NCP can rebuild the state on its own
terms." This strategy would be a disaster not only for
Sudan, Amum predicted, but for also Chad, Eritrea, and even
Egypt. Moreover, though Western leaders might not think this
type of scenario is possible, the NCP does -- and so does
Al-Qaeda. "They're more focused on Sudan today than they are
on any other country," Amum argued.


7. (C) Surely, Hume suggested, there must be another way: if
the NCP believes it can survive in a democracy, it will be
less tempted to destroy the state to save itself. Amum
agreed, eloquently noting that this alternative provided all
the more reason to reinforce the CPA, and support the SPLA.
There was a power struggle within the NCP, and President Omar
al-Bashir was in the middle of it. "Bashir is an emotional
man," he observed -- noting the President's recent outbursts
about UN peacekeeping forces in Darfur -- but "he does have
some basic goodness, and even a type of innocence." Bashir
had been "taken in" by Second Vice President Ali Osman Taha,
Amum said, joking that Taha had "taken him places and left
him there." Taha had set traps for Bashir in Abyei, where
Bashir had rejected the boundary commission report without
really understanding it, and now in Darfur, where Bashir had
refused to allow UN peackeepers without considering the
alternatives. "Ali is trying to improve his image," Amum
mused about his old negotiating partner from Naivasha. "And
Bashir is helping him."

"Positive Pressure" Needed
--------------


8. (C) Pressure from the international community might help,
Amum suggested, but not "negative pressure" in the form of
more sanctions. Rather, the international community ought to
apply "positive pressure," Amum said. "I'm talking about
taking sanctions away, showing Bashir a way out, and giving
him a real choice."
HUME