Money has talked too much this month

Dr. Lual Deng said "look at the Americans they have whites, blacks, browns and yellows. They fought a civil war, and faced many problems but they insisted on the unity of the United States. Today, they have a great model for all the world in pluralism, racial and religious tolerance." Money has talked louder when Dr. Lual tried his best vaguely to compare America and Sudan.

America is a great country that respects its citizens while Sudan is the worst in its records of rights pertaining to humans. Money talked louder when Dr. Lual on his piece, compared a country founded of liberty, freedoms, rights to a country ruled by military dictators, sharia and anarchy.

Money has talked louder when Dr. Lual said that "Southerners have the most freedom in the country than northerners." Well, Southerners have no any freedom whatsoever since the independence of Sudan to now and as we can see further, development is lacking in the South; no roads, no electricity, no hospitals, infrastructure is lacking on most schools sites while government building are not in good concrete forms. What is Dr. Lual talking about? The fact that he was a separatist and now he is not is a sure sign that money has pressed hard on him to talk negatively. Southerners want to be free not under second class citizenship category but in sovereignty of their own state. It is not enough having two million ministers from South but it is important making the whole country free and all its inhabitants.

It was a mistake made by money when it talked louder through Dr. Lual that \"Washington does not want the emergence of new separatists movements elsewhere in the continent.\" We are not a new separatist movement emerging or else but we are a movement of freedom that has fought for years to liberate South from the anarchy of the present and past gone regimes in the north. We cannot be pleasing any organisation or government by burying our fundamental rights, and remember that we are neither free when only a few of us are ministers under the current anarchy of NCP. Money is talking faster nowadays and it is it that made a well known separatist talk while on his way to US through Kampala after receiving a huge sum from Khartoum two weeks ago. Money is talking and money will do so from now to the end of December but it is our hope that liberty and freedom will determine the dead end of the road Southerners are journeying through.

Those who are wrestling with money should know that Jallabas are smart players, they know how to trick for now in order to exchange it for the worst later. Unionist like Dr. Lual and others are not suppose to misrepresent the strong stance of Dr. John Garang on separation. Dr. John, our most visionary leader knew that Jallabas are playing a dirty game with us through arabising and islamising us and with gradual intent to expand it continentally overtime. That is why he urged them to make unity attractive, meaning, to remove the sharia from the constitution as to fit us all under a pluralistic model in a democratic new Sudan. Therefore, separating for now and reuniting when sharia fades away from the constitution in the future, lies central in the dream of our leader Dr. John Garang de Mabior. Even if sharia is automatically removed from the constitution right now, we would still be opting for separation to avoid the anarchy and the oppression that we have been through since the independence of Sudan.

We are Africans and we need to join the union of eastern African countries like Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania. Unity of Sudan will only lead to the demise of our African heritage and its complete harmony which is reflected in the way countries like Kenya and Uganda are. It is true that we have been suppressed by arab regimes in the north for a very long time and that is why north is developed while south is not. Let north go separate as that will not affect the development in the south. Separation is better and we need a Juba that looks like Nairobi or pretoria within ten years time.

On another separate incident this week, Ahmad Ibrahim al Tahir, the speaker of Sudan's national assembly got it totally wrong when he criticized the move organized by GoSS to repatriate Southerners living in the north as a "violation of referendum law and an obstruction to freedom of voting." Ahmad al-Tahir could have put it correctly that keeping those voters in khartoum or other areas of north Sudan is itself an obstruction to freedom of choice which only the voters can make by casting their papers. Repatriation should be made voluntary so that all Southerners are repatriated to South Sudan before December. We do not want those Southerners to remain in the north, it may create fear of reprisal attacks after independence or the NIF may use them as a scapegoat to create border demarcation complications and all other threats leading to regotiation of post-referendum issues.

Post-referendum issues like oil, citizenship and free trade between the two economies are good to be discussed further with exception of national debt only. South does not have anything to do with further discussion of debts except the debt from 2005-2011. It is the responsibility of NIF to deal with all the debts owed by IMF and other sources of lending. South will not help in paying those debts because they were only used in building Khartoum and other northern cities. North Sudan should deal with debts which it used to kill the two million Southerners during its years of aerial bombardment in the region. South should apply for funding as a fresh country owing no debts to any lending source in the world.

Yohannes Kong Tut, Juba, South Sudan

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