Saturday, January 8, 2011

A broken country




In 2005, when the CPA was signed, I did not expect this day to come. At the time, the idea of secession seemed absurd. We were always going to be one country. John Garang was alive and he was going to run for presidency and I was going to vote for him. Even my grandmother said she would vote for him. He repeated slogans such as "united we stand, divided we fall" and mesmerized us when he described the new Sudan.

The New Sudan was a reality and change was going to happen in my lifetime.

I was wrong.

John Garang died in a plane crash and unity died with him. It was buried with him. We believed in the New Sudan and forgot that the old Sudan is cursed.
"We are a cursed nation," my mother tells me. Days before Nimeri was expected to sign a peace agreement, he was toppled and the war dragged on. A month after Garang became the vice-president, he died.

Hell broke loose.

Khartoum, the safest capital in Africa (as we claim) was suddenly a battle-zone. Cars were burned, people were killed, age-old ethnic divisions were unleashed and we were reminded that it takes a very long time for survivors of war to let go of their grudges...
The ugly face of the Northern/Southern division was exposed, hopes for unity were shattered.

Today is Saturday the 8th of Januruary 2011, tomorrow is the day I've never expected to see. Southerners will head to the polls and vote on whether they would like to secede from the North or remain united with the North.

The outcome seems like a fact, secession is inevitable.

"They will seperate for a year or two, then they will come back and join the north. They can't have their own country, they need us," said an acquaintance, matter-of-factly......Denial is not just a river in Egypt....

The official argument is that the North has failed to make unity attractive in the past 6 years. People deliberately overlook the fact that the country has been seperating for over 50 years. Ever since Africa's longest-running civil war began, the idea of seperation or "independence" was popular in the south.

I've been thinking a lot about the referendum lately. How does it make me feel? How am I expected to feel? How does it feel to have your country split into two? How does it feel when Sudan is no longer Africa's largest country?

I'm still thinking

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

حوار مع الرئيس السودانى الأسبق الفريق سوار الذهب : أتمنى أن تزول الحدود بين مصر والسودان ونصبح دولة وادى النيل

أجرى الحوار فى أبوظبى محمد الجداوى

يؤكد «سوار الذهب»، فى حواره فى 20 نوفمبر 2010 لجريدة المصرى اليوم فى أبوظبى ، أن السودان مستهدف، وأن انفصال الجنوب يفقده سُدس مساحته الغنية، ويؤثر على دول الجوار واتفاقيات المياه، مشيراً إلى أن الحفاظ على وحدة السودان مسؤولية العرب جميعاً، وأن الحدود التى تركها الاستعمار فى أفريقيا يجب ألا تتغير.
وقال: «نقبل أن يكون رئيس السودان مسيحياً طالما كان ذلك فى مصلحة الوحدة، وزمن الانقلابات العسكرية انتهى، ولابد من التغيير السلمى فى العالم العربى»، مشيراً إلى أن دور مصر فى السودان ضعيف واستثماراتها بسيطة.

وفيما يلى نص الحوار:


■ انفصال الجنوب – لو حدث- كيف ترى تأثيره على السودان؟
- لو حدث ذلك فسيكون بداية إلى تمزيق وتقسيم السودان إلى دويلات صغيرة، ويجب أن يكون فى تصور الناس أنه لو انفصل الجنوب فستحذو بعض الولايات الأخرى مثل إقليم دارفور وغيره نفس الحذو، مادامت هناك ضغوط وتشجيع من بعض الدول التى تعادى السودان، لذلك يجب أن يتحسب الشعب السودانى لمثل هذه الإجراءات والتطلعات نحو الانفصال.

■ فى رأيك.. هل مصر مقصرة فى دعم وحدة السودان؟
- شخصياً، كنت أتصور أن يكون للإخوة المصريين دور أوسع من ذلك، لأن بقاء السودان موحداً فى مصلحة مصر، كما هو فى مصلحة السودان، وأنا من الذين يتمنون أن تزول الحدود بين مصر والسودان، ونصبح دولة وادى النيل التى كنا ندعو لها ولانزال.

■ وهل مازلت تحلم بهذا الحلم؟
- نعم لقد كنا دولة واحدة تحت التاج المصرى، وأتمنى أن يتحقق ذلك ونعود كما كنا، وأتصور أن مجريات الأحداث فى العالم تدعونا فى البلدين إلى التفكير جدياً فى هذه القضية، لأن التكامل الاقتصادى والزراعى بين مصر والسودان ضرورة حتمية لا مفر منها، ولا بد من توفير الغذاء لشعبينا، والحمد لله السودان يتمتع بوفرة فى الأراضى الصالحة للزراعة، وهناك دعوات كثيرة –فيما أعلم– وجهها الرئيس عمر البشير لفخامة الرئيس مبارك لكى ينظرا معاً فى موضوع زراعة مشتركة فى السودان، من المؤكد حال حدوثها أنها ستفيد البلدين.

باقى الحوار منشور فى صفحة الحوادث بالموقع التالى
www.ouregypt.us

و لا يفوتك الذهاب إلى صفحة من الشرق و الغرب بنفس الموقع و قراءة موضوع السودان فى مهب الريح و به كلمة الشيخ يوسف القرضاوى عن مؤامرة تقسيم السودان..

Voluntary Voice (VV) said...

You are a brilliant writer, continue.

fake consultant said...

as i understand it, there is a considerable interest in what happens to the oil resource.

what we hear is that it may be true that the resource is physically located in the south, but it needs to be sent north to get out to market.

do you have any thoughts about how that will change the relationship between the north and the south?

and a second question: it's possible to look at a map and see that port sudan would be a logical place to build an oil export terminal, and i wonder if you have any thoughts about how the relationship between north and south might change if that were to occur?

Faithful Okoye said...

This is really interesting. I never thought of this other side before...