Millions of people start voting in the south sudan independence poll

[Xaaji Xunjuf]

Millions start voting in South Sudan independence poll

 

(2011-01-09)

 

South Sudanese men hold voting registration cards as they wait in the line to vote at a polling station during the referendum in Juba

(Reuters) -

By Jason Benham

 

JUBA, Sudan (Reuters) - Millions of jubilant south Sudanese started voting on Sunday in a long-awaited independence referendum that is expected to see their war-ravaged region emerge as a new nation.

 

Huge queues built up outside polling stations before dawn in the southern capital Juba where banners described the week-long ballot as a "Last March to Freedom" after decades of civil war and perceived repression by north Sudan.

 

"I am voting for separation," said Nhial Wier, a veteran of the north-south civil war that led up to the vote. "This day marks the end of my struggles. In the army I was fighting for freedom. I was fighting for separation."

 

The referendum was promised in a 2005 peace deal that ended Africa's longest civil war, fueled by oil and ethnicity, between the mostly Muslim north and the south, where most people follow Christianity and traditional beliefs.

 

In the north, the prospect of losing a quarter of the country's land mass -- and the source of most of its oil -- has been greeted with resignation and some resentment.

 

Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who campaigned for unity in the run-up to the vote, has been making increasingly conciliatory comments and this month promised to join independence celebrations, if that was the outcome.

 

U.S. President Barack Obama on Saturday said a peaceful, orderly referendum could help put Sudan back on a path toward normal relations with the United States after years of sanctions but warned a chaotic vote will mean more isolation.

 

Southern president Salva Kiir urged long lines of voters to be patient after casting his ballot at 8 a.m. (0500 GMT).

 

"I believe Doctor John (Garang) and all those who died with him are with us today and I want to assure them they have not died in vain," he said, referring to the southern rebel leader who died in a helicopter crash months after signing the accord.

 

Juba and Khartoum already looked liked the capitals of two different countries on Sunday.

 

In Juba, actor George Clooney and U.S. Senator John Kerry mingled with dancing and singing crowds. Voters waiting outside one polling station burst into a rendition of the hymn "This is the day that the Lord has made."

 

"It is something to see people actually voting for their freedom. That's not something you see often in your life," Clooney told Reuters.

 

In Khartoum voting centres were empty, and southern districts were quiet -- tens of thousands of exiled southerners have returned for the vote. There were no banners acknowledging the historic referendum.

 

ALL VOTE MATERIALS DELIVERED

 

The vote's organising commission told Reuters it had defied gloomy forecasts of delays to deliver all voting materials on time for Sunday's deadline.

 

The logistical achievements have not been matched by political progress. Southerners went to the polls without knowing the exact position of their border with the north or how much of Sudan's debt they will have to shoulder after a split.

 

The two sides have been locked in negotiations for months over how they might share out oil revenues -- the lifeblood of both their economies -- and settle other issues after secession. There is no public sign of progress.

 

The south also will have to face up to its own internal ethnic rivalries and resolve a bitter dispute with the north over the ownership of the central Abyei region, where there were reports of clashes involving Arab nomads on Friday and Saturday.

 

Still, north and south proceeded to the referendum while drawing a line under more than half a century of fighting.

 

"The risk is always there. There is always lots of tinder about and there are a lot of unresolved issues, including Abyei," said Derek Plumbly, chairman of the Assessment and Evaluation Commission that monitors the north-south peace deal.

 

"But neither side really wants to go back to war. I believe they will find their way through."

 

(Additional reporting by Jeremy Clarke in Juba, Andrew Heavens and Opheera McDoom in Khartoum; writing by Andrew Heavens; editing by Myra MacDonald)

 

© Copyright 2011, Reuters

[Somalina]

The logistical achievements have not been matched by political progress. Southerners went to the polls

without knowing the exact position of their border with the north

or how much of Sudan's debt they will have to shoulder after a split.

 

The two sides have been locked in negotiations for months over how they might share out oil revenues -- the lifeblood of both their economies -- and settle other issues after secession. There is no public sign of progress.

 

The south also will have to face up to its own internal ethnic rivalries and resolve a bitter dispute with the north over the ownership of the central Abyei region, where there were reports of clashes involving Arab nomads on Friday and Saturday.

Dagaalka ethnicity-ga iyo oil-ka ma joojismaa after S South becomes an independent nation?

[Somalina]

Southern Sudan is tribal, mostly Christian or animist, and its people have darker skin, and speak other languages.

[Xaaji Xunjuf]

Sudan ends first day of referendum on splitting state into two nations

Written by RIA

Jan 09, 2011 at 11:58 AM

Polling stations in Sudan, in which the country may split into two independent countries, closed on Sunday, a RIA Novosti correspondent has reported.

 

Polling stations in 10 states in Southern Sudan, as well as stations in the north of the country, closed at 14:00 GMT. The Sudanese are voting on a referendum to either remain as a unified state or divide the largest African nation of around 44 million people into two states.

 

The elections are being monitored by more than 20,000 observers and over 1,000 journalists from around the world.

 

"Election committees from around the world should study the experience of the Sudanese commission on holding the referendum," the head of Russia's observer delegation, Senator Aslanbek Aslakhanov, told RIA Novosti.

 

The results of the referendum will be announced at the end of voting, which will end on January 15.

 

The majority of Southern Sudanese belong to various culture and language tribes, however, most speak Arabic as do their Northern neighbors. The majority of Southerners are voting to gain independence.

 

Russian Senator Vladimir Zhidkikh, who has participated in over 20 electoral processes around the world, said it would be difficult to complain about the illegitimacy of the elections to the Sudanese governments as everything was well organized.

 

"The technology in holding the polls does not bring about any doubts, the participants in the referendum have a complete stack of accompanying documents [to the referendum], and the process of voting is clear to even those who cannot read or write," Zhidkikh said.

 

KHARTOUM, January 9 (RIA Novosti)

[Xaaji Xunjuf]

South Sudanese turn out to vote

Updated: 10:00, Monday January 10, 2011

 

Southern Sudanese turned out in jubilant droves on Sunday to vote in a referendum expected to lead to the partition of Africa's largest nation and the creation of the world's 193rd UN member state.

 

Chan Reec, deputy head of the South Sudan Referendum Commission, hailed the massive turnout in the first hours of the week-long independence vote.

 

'I can't express it. This is the size of turnout we have never witnessed before, even during the election,' he told AFP, referring to last April's presidential, parliamentary and state elections.

 

'There is singing, there is dancing, this is a day like no other in the history of the people of south Sudan,' he said.

 

South Sudanese president Salva Kiir proclaimed the event an 'historic moment' for his people as he was among the first to cast his ballot in the regional capital Juba when polling stations opened at 8.00am (1600 AEDT).

 

The independence referendum is a key plank of the 2005 north-south peace deal that ended a devastating 22-year civil war in which about two million people were killed and another four million displaced.

 

Thousands had queued through the night to be among the first to have their say on whether the impoverished south should finally break away from rule by Khartoum, ending five decades of conflict between north and south.

 

'This is the historic moment the people of south Sudan have been waiting for,' Kiir said, holding up his hand to reporters to show the indelible ink that demonstrated he had voted.

 

US envoys Scott Gration and John Kerry as well as Hollywood star George Clooney watched as he cast his ballot at a polling station set up at the memorial to late rebel leader John Garang in the regional capital Juba.

 

It was Garang who signed the 2005 peace agreement that provided for Sunday's referendum, shortly before his death in a mysterious helicopter crash on his way back from Uganda.

 

Kiir paid tribute to his predecessor. Garang's widow Rebecca said she inevitably felt some ambivalence.

 

'I have mixed feelings about this day for I know that my husband did not die in vain and I know that freedom has a price,' she said.

 

Kiir pleaded for the forbearance of the hordes of enthusiastic voters.

 

'I would like to call on all south Sudanese people to be patient in case anyone does not have time to cast his or her vote today,' Kiir said.

 

Polls were due to close at 5.00pm (0100 AEDT Monday) on the first day of the seven-day referendum.

 

Southern leaders had been keen to get the voters out as the 2005 peace deal requires a turnout of at least 60 per cent for the referendum to be valid. The outcome will then be decided by simple majority.

 

Kerry, who along with Gration had engaged in intensive shuttle diplomacy for months to clear the way for the momentous vote, told AFP after watching Kiir cast his vote that the referendum represented a 'new chapter' for Sudan.

 

Clooney, who has long campaigned passionately for Sudan, described the launch of the referendum as a 'great day for all the world'.

 

Euphoria gripped Juba as people feted the looming end of a long and often difficult countdown.

 

Yar Mayon, who grew up in refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya, said: 'I came here in the early morning because I wanted to show just how much I wanted to vote.'

 

'It was so important to me I could not sleep,' she said.

 

As the sun rose, another voter, Wilson Santino said: 'This is a new dawn because we vote for our freedom.

 

'We have been fighting for too many years, but today this vote for separation is also for peace. Soon the sun will be shining over a free south Sudan.'

 

But the celebrations were overshadowed by deadly clashes with armed tribesmen and renegade militiamen in two remote oil-producing districts on the north-south border that were bitterly contested in the 1983-2005 civil war.

 

Kiir told his people in an eve of polling day message that they faced the 'most vital and extremely important decision of our lifetime'.

 

'The referendum is not the end of the journey but rather the beginning of a new one,' he added, alluding to the six-month transitional period to recognition as an independent state stipulated by the 2005 peace agreement.

 

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, an army man who led the north's war effort against the south for a decade and a half before signing the 2005 peace deal, has said he will respect the outcome of the vote if it is 'free and transparent'.

 

In an opinion article published by the New York Times on Saturday, US President Barack Obama pledged that if Khartoum lived up to its obligations under the 2005 peace deal and respected the outcome of the vote, it could be removed from a US list of state sponsors of terrorism.

 

The rift between the Muslim, mainly Arab north, and the African, mainly Christian south, has blighted Sudan virtually since independence from Britain in 1956, fuelled by religion, ethnicity, ideology and resources, particularly oil.