Southern Sudanese Head Home to Be Counted in Census

Source: The Daily Nation, Nairobi.

Badru Mulumba, Juba

The displaced people of South Sudan living in the north of the country are determined to go back home for next month's census, and nothing will make them to stay - not the cheap loans or the plots of land they are being offered.

Sudan's First vice president Salva Kiir gestures to leaders at a past meeting in Juba.The census is key to policy formulation in the South.

"This is a known fact," Mr Simon Kun Puoc, the chairperson of the Southern Sudan Repatriation and Rehabilitation Commission said today. "But our people are not willing to accept it."

South Sudan's internally displaced people are rushing home ahead of a national census.

Four convoys with about 3,000 returnees headed south today, with another three convoys to follow next week, Southern Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Commission chairperson said during an interview.

"As of today, we have four convoys coming to Upper Nile," Mr Puoc said, referring to the southern Sudan state that borders north Sudan. "That's the largest number of returnees we have recorded," he said, adding that many have given up a luxurious life in Khartoum to return for the census. "By April 15, a good number will have returned."

The South Sudan census scheduled for April 15, the first since 1993, will form the basis for wealth and power sharing between the Southern Sudan government led by Mr Salva Kiir and the North.

Mr Stans Yatta Milas, a repatriation official, told reporters last month that government was giving loans to Southern Sudanese in Khartoum. They are expected to repay the loans if they decide to relocate.

Last year, officials from the Southern Sudan census office who went to Khartoum to encourage displaced persons to return heard that some had been offered land to persuade them to stay.

But some displaced persons have returned voluntarily. The repatriation commission says it received 13, 000 voluntary returnees from Khartoum last year.

The increase in north-south movement of displaced persons replicates a trend shown by refugees.

Anticipating a surge

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees announced last week that it was "anticipating a surge in repatriation movements from countries neighbouring Southern Sudan". The agency reported that there have been 15,700 organised returns since January, which is three times the number during the same period last year.

The weekly refugee return rate rose from 600 people at the beginning of the year to 3,000 at the beginning of March, said UNHCR spokesperson Fatoumata Kaba. Of the returnees, close to 10,000 were from Uganda, but February returns from Kenya surged to 2,500, which was way above the 600 monthly Kenya average.