South Sudan postpones its first elections scheduled for late 2024 by two years

The people of South Sudan will still have to wait before taking part in the first elections in the country’s young history, intended to put an end to a transitional period decided in a 2018 peace agreement, announced, on Friday 13 September, a two-year extension of the transitional period as well as the postponement to December 22, 2026 of the elections, initially scheduled for December 2024, according to the Facebook page of the government of this country independent since 2011.

The 2018 peace agreement that ended five years of a deadly civil war (400,000 dead and millions displaced) established the principle of a national unity government that would bring together the two rivals who set the country on fire and bloodshed, Salva Kiir and Riek Machar, respectively, to the posts of president and first vice president.

Formed after numerous delays in February 2020, this government was tasked with implementing the agreement and carrying out a transition that would conclude with elections. Its initial mandate was thirty months.

But South Sudan, a country of 12 million people and one of the poorest in the world, remains undermined by power struggles, corruption and local ethnic conflicts. Progress in key areas of the agreement (drafting a constitution, creating a unified army, etc.) remains limited.

“A total disappointment”

The government has repeatedly postponed the end of this “transition” period. The latest extension set its deadline for February 2025, after the elections in December 2024.

“It is a total disappointment”Edmund Yakani, a civil society leader at the head of the Community Empowerment for Progress (CEPO) organization, reacted to Agence France-Presse. The authorities had “enough time” organize elections but only “delay decision making” to get to this situation, he estimated. According to him, “These extensions were used as a strategy to hold on to power”.

For years, international partners have continued to call on the Juba authorities to act so that the people of South Sudan can elect their leaders for the first time in their history. In April, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for action. “urgent measures” to allow elections to be held in December.

The troika (the United Kingdom, Norway and the United States) that sponsored the country’s independence also urged the parties in June to work together and avoid delays. “consequent”. “History will judge harshly the leaders who did not work to make these elections possible or who acted to prevent them”said in a joint press release.

A country kept in poverty

President Salva Kiir has repeatedly stated his desire to respect the deadlines, but without any notable progress in organising the elections. A Council of Political Parties and an electoral commission were set up, but no concrete steps have been taken since then, and voter registration operations announced to begin in June have stalled. Riek Machar, for his part, announced in March that he would boycott all elections as long as key provisions of the peace agreement were not implemented.

Political disputes, communal violence and climatic calamities (droughts, floods) keep the country in misery. Nine million people, including refugees from war-torn neighbouring Sudan, need humanitarian aid, according to UN figures published in June.

South Sudan also lost its main source of income after a pipeline that allowed it to export its oil was damaged by fighting in Sudan. This incident caused the local currency to fall. The oil sector provides 90% of the income of this landlocked country and accounts for almost all of its exports, according to the World Bank.

Extraordinary oil revenues are also largely diverted to political and personal enrichment purposes in this country, which is ranked among the most corrupt in the world by the NGO Transparency International (177).^my of 180).