South African envoy renews mediation mission in South Sudan

Deputy President David Mabuza, in his capacity as Special Envoy to South Sudan, has renewed his mission on facilitating a solution to the issue of states and their boundaries in the war-torn country, his office said on Tuesday.

Mabuza’s facilitation is aimed at finding an agreement on the number of states and their boundaries, which is one of the outstanding issues towards the formation of the Revitalized Transitional Government of National Unity (RTGNU) in South Sudan, said Mabuza’s Media Liaison Officer Matshepo Seedat.

At the December 2019 meeting, signatories to the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS), signed in 2018, could not reach common position on the number of states and their boundaries.

Mabuza, along with other special envoys, proposed an arbitrated mechanism to break the impasse, thereby paving the way for the formation of the RTGNU on or before the expiry of the current 100-day pre-transitional extended period.

As the concerned parties requested time to make further consultations on the proposed mechanism and its modalities, special envoys to South Sudan, led by Mabuza, granted the request to consult and firm up their negotiation texts.

As a result, Mabuza has returned to South Sudan to further facilitate a meeting of the concerned parties towards agreement on the number of states and their boundaries or an arbitrated process as a mechanism to break the impasse, Seedat said.

Mabuza is hopeful of a breakthrough as the parties to the R-ARCSS have all expressed their commitment to the formation of a RTGNU by the end of the current extension period, according to Seedat.

Shortly after its independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan plunged into civil war. At least 300,000 people are estimated to have died since late 2013, some 1.8 million people are displaced internally and 2.5 million others have fled to neighboring countries. Enditem