Omar Al-Bashir and Africa's Longest War

by Paul Moorcraft

  The all-volunteer team I led worked hard to help the electoral process in Sudan. They were just about to fly home from Khartoum airport, when suddenly all flights to and from much of the northern hemisphere were stopped because of the ash cloud erupting from an Icelandic volcano. After forty years of working in conflict zones, I faced my toughest challenge: keeping fifty irritable and homesick Brits happy, occupied, housed and fed in an expensive city where they could not use credit or alcohol. Most eventually got home to Britain ten days later.

  The UN had done an impressive job – their separate mission in the south (UNMIS or UN Mission in Sudan) had pulled out all the stops, despite their usual lack of resources, especially air transport. The large (and occasionally imperious) EU mission, however, complained of a failure of UN cooperation. As Mission Head, I attended some of the top-level meetings. I was astounded at the vituperation I sometimes witnessed: the most remarkable was the dressing down the deputy head of the EU delegation gave to the UN chief. The EU representative angrily and repeatedly waved and collapsed her fan – she was Spanish – and then used it to metaphorically jab the startled UN man, accompanied by a loud Latin torrent of criticism. The urbane Indian brigadier present had to try to calm the meeting. And they would have to do it all again the following year, for the referendum.

  President al-Bashir felt vindicated – he had held an election under intense international scrutiny and he judged that he had won the approval of the north.

  Al-Bashir knew that the south would vote the same way again – overwhelmingly for Salva Kiir, who was committed to separation from Sudan. John Garang had been dead for five years. The SPLM would always revere him, but the vast majority of his followers had fought for independence, not federalism. And what had the north fought for? If the south broke away, what had all the lost lives been for? And could the north survive if southern oil was turned off or diverted? Perhaps the majority of northerners had had enough of war and jihad and prayed for that rare thing, an amicable divorce. Some hardliners in the military and intelligence services, however, grumbled that their president had gambled and lost. The potential coup plotters would bide their time and wait for the referendum results and the immediate aftermath of the likely independence. It might all depend on how the new rulers in Juba behaved.

  The southern referendum

  South Sudan was set to become the fifty-fourth African state in July 2011 – would premature and triumphalist celebrations prompt the resumption of the long war? This time I was there with a film crew, not as an observer. We were rarely obstructed in our travels in the south, but media registration was a nightmare. The UN had repeatedly told GoSS that this was a unique opportunity to attract positive publicity and possibly investment by welcoming the hundreds of hacks who had expended the time, trouble and expense to get to inaccessible Juba. Rip-off prices for accommodation and transport were to be expected, but the expensive obstacle race – $100 per person per stamp, around various government offices to pay cash for a permit to travel, report, write and possibly breathe – angered the most seasoned of old Africa hands. GoSS’s corruption and inept bureaucracy were vividly showcased. My team received some of the required permits and accreditation via urgent UN intercession. It was a bad start for the world’s coverage of the referendum, and the new country.

  The referendum was held over seven days in January 2011. Previously, 3.9 million of the estimated eight million southerners had registered to vote. And nearly every registered voter turned out, with over 99 per cent opting for an independent south Sudan. Except for isolated incidents, the voting was peaceful. The fighting in the village of Makir Abior, about six miles north of Abyei town, part of the disputed border, killed more than thirty people. Al Jazeera, which had over forty personnel in the south, played up the possibility of border clashes and northern intervention, but this did not materialize. The referenda were ‘delayed’ in the three large disputed border areas, however. They remain delayed.

  Elsewhere in the ten southern states, the voters showed patience and commitment as they queued in the heat after walking miles to isolated polling stations. According to Western international observers, the polling was largely free and fair. Voting by southerners in the north was very low compared with the south, though an estimated 180,000 southerners made their way back, by road or river, to vote in their homeland.

  While endorsing the process, international observers did note problems with voter registration, especially eligibility to vote, and a lack of voter education. As in the previous year’s election, many enthusiastic would-be voters could not find their names even when they found the correct polling stations. Much assisted voting was witnessed, though this was again usually well-intentioned because of the very high levels of illiteracy. Many examples of security officials, especially police, being present inside the polling centres were also recorded. Nevertheless, it was absolutely clear that southerners voted en masse and freely – often passionately – for independence.

  The referendum may have demonstrated the passionate desire for independence, but it also showed the shortcomings of the fledgling government of south Sudan. Southerners living in the north – two to three million had fled there during the decades of war – were urged by the southern government to return home. Thousands came by river along the White Nile. The gruelling journey usually took two and a half weeks. When they reached Juba port many were exhausted and some, especially children, were ill. In a few cases clergymen brought their whole congregations with them. Stephen Taban, of the Episcopalian church, had lived for twenty-two years in Khartoum. He pointed at the numerous people camped around him at the port: ‘Some had relatives here, others don’t. Some don’t have food to eat. They really need help.’ Some came for individual patriotic reasons. One blind 84-year-old lady was crying with joy to come back to the land she had last visited in 1949. Despite having to squat at the port, most were glad to be home, but complained about the lack of support from GoSS. The government responded by setting up mobile clinics, although the medical reception for the returnees was generally inadequate. Jobs and homes for the many returnees would still have to be found in one of the poorest regions of Africa. Nevertheless, none of the southerners I interviewed said they left because of northern pressure on them.

  Many northerners – often Muslim businessmen – chose to return to the north either temporarily during the referendum, fearing rioting or looting, or in some cases left permanently. Many shops in the Muslim business area of Juba had shut during the referendum. The businessmen said that no local pressure had been put on them, though some had returned to Khartoum because of concerns among their relatives in the north. Yet other northern businessmen – many who had lived in the south for their whole lives – claimed that up to 5,000 merchants – in the countryside outside Juba – had not been allowed to get back their farms and shops which had been seized by the SPLA, despite promises from the ruling party. Siddig Mohamed Korak, a spokesman for dispossessed businessmen, said he had grown up in the south. Interviewed in Khartoum, he said: ‘I lost US$ 50 million [in farms and plantations]. They [the SPLA] are looting everything – goods – cars and tractors. They are looting since the war.’

  Southern Sudan was desperately underdeveloped. Approximately 90 per cent of the inhabitants lived on less than a dollar a day. Half required food aid. Corruption was endemic. The prime issue was still a settled border. Disputes, particularly over Abyei, festered. Thabo Mbeki, the AU mediator, had not done any better here than he did in Zimbabwe, said local critics. Arguments over sharing the national debt had not been reconciled. Nor had citizenship been resolved – this was paramount to prevent the mass exodus of southerners in the north and vice versa. Bosnian-style forced transfers of people threatened to destabilize both north and south. After the referendum result, the usually cool President Mbeki, as AU envoy, did heatedly complain that the north was pushing out southerners if they could not prove a patrilineal descent from the north. And the NCP elite – many of whom also held Brit
ish or US passports – would not allow dual nationality to southerners. The official slogan was ‘four freedoms’ – including the right for southerners to live and work in the north – but many felt compelled to sell up and move south.

  Besides aid, Southern Sudan was almost totally dependent on oil – 80 per cent of proven reserves were in the south, but the pipelines to the sea from the landlocked south ran through northern Sudan. Peaceful cooperation made sense. Talk of building alternative pipelines, through difficult terrain, to the sea via Kenya did not make sense, because of the high costs and the probability that southern oil output would soon peak and then decline rapidly. Border disputes could have sparked off war by accident. Tribal clashes spawned by dissident warlords were also to be expected. Much depended on the attitude of Khartoum, which was about to lose one-third of its territory and much of its oil revenue. Some northerners were relieved to be rid of the burden of the exhausting southern war. Others feared that the north would become a harsh Islamist police state, whether or not al-Bashir survived the rumoured coup attempt or copycat mass demonstrations on the model of Egypt as part of the Arab Spring. Al-Bashir told local media in Khartoum, ‘Those who are waiting for the Arab Spring to come [to Sudan] will be waiting a while.’

  Even if a resumption of war were avoided, south Sudan had to contend with numerous other difficulties, not least the crisis of expectations of its own people. SPLM leaders insisted that their new country would be like South Africa. They were (understandably) irritated when I suggested it could be another devastated basket-case like Zimbabwe. So would South Sudan be a multi-party democratic state? That was asking a lot of the cocksure dominant party, the SPLM.

  I spoke to Joseph Lagu, the veteran military commander, just after the referendum results were announced. He grew rather animated and waved his stick, when I asked about the country’s poverty. ‘I don’t know why people call us the poorest people in Africa,’ he said, ‘when we have oil under the surface of our soil. And we have got other minerals and we have got green agricultural land.’ Yes, the country had many prospects but, as the last decades had shown, nothing could happen without peace.

  The referendum was peaceful – so would be the reactions of the north, it was hoped. The state would be recognized, not least by their African neighbours. Nevertheless, a successful breakaway worried the African Union, which faced separatist movements throughout Africa. The helpful role of the UN should be acknowledged in the referendum. And al-Bashir’s visit to Juba and positive comments while in the south also helped to soothe tensions. He did not treat the south as an awkward stepchild; rather he would magnanimously be the first to recognize the new republic. Whether independence heralded peace in a very troubled region depended ultimately on the wisdom of the politicians in Khartoum and Juba – and not the diplomacy of the AU, EU, China or the US.

  Khartoum displayed again a self-deceptive approach to American promises. Al-Bashir’s intelligence advisers reckoned that the State Department had unofficially promised that President Obama would remove all sanctions if the southern referendum and independence went smoothly. In January 2011 the State Department did release a formal statement thanking al-Bashir for his cooperation. Sanctions remained.

  Independence

  The independence of the Republic of South Sudan on 9 July 2011 was the culmination of a complicated international peace process that consumed a decade of haggling and intermittent violence. The mood of celebration, especially in Juba, was understandable. The joys of statehood and freedom were tangible. Consignments of the new flag, based on the former emblem of the SPLA, were shipped in from a helpful China. The creation of the new national anthem, the words forged by a collective of poets and the music involving a national competition, was on everybody’s lips. ‘Oh black warriors, let’s stand up in silence and respect, saluting our martyrs whose blood cemented our national foundation.’ Not a Eurovision hit, though it went down well locally. Peace now promised so much, but also generated a crisis of expectation – a wish list as long as the Nile.

  A new currency was yet to be produced to replace the Sudanese one. And a place had to be found in the UN. The hall of the General Assembly was full. When a place was created, because the listing is in English alphabetical order, the fledgling country would be placed next to South Africa, if it decided on just ‘South Sudan’. There was, typically, still much dispute about what the country should be called – ‘South Sudan’ was seen as a British or northern construct and insufficiently African. Purists preferred ‘Nile’ somewhere in the title. Juba’s UN diplomats had yet to set up an office in New York. When South Sudan became a full member of the UN, it could organize its own postal stamps through the Universal Postal Union. For the time being, the post had to work through the system based in Khartoum. There was even talk of relocating Juba, still a largely shanty development with little infrastructure. Would the money materialize to build a new more central – but tribally neutral – capital?

  A new internet domain had to be agreed. One that was possible was ‘SS’, but that had obvious negative connotations. South Sudan also wanted to develop its own national football team and take part in the 2012 Olympics. So many grand plans and such a pitiful national infrastructure. Freedom was a heady brew, but in the 2011 drought South Sudanese could not eat freedom. Also, the country had one of the worst maternal mortality rates in the world. And over 84 per cent of women were totally illiterate. At least they could aspire to learn to read in English, the official language.

  Technically, South Sudan was a rich country, full of very poor people. Around 95 per cent of government revenue came from oil. Agricultural potential was high, but the farms and estates had been devastated by war. Statistically the country was already a failed state, so how could it rebuild itself? Foreign aid could help to feed the eight million population in the short term, though aid is addictive, undermines local initiative and often fuels corruption and cronyism. The return of experts from the diaspora would help, as would the flow of professional people from the north (which might balance the exit of southern Muslim businessmen).

  Mass population transfers and religious and ethnic cleansing were then a clear danger, which could have been resolved by a deal on dual citizenship, though even more pressing were tribal conflicts in the south. Border fighting in Abyei and in South Kordofan dragged on throughout 2011. Common sense dictated that the two new countries should settle on an amicable divorce to share the oil wealth. The sharing of the national debt had to be settled too. Many southern leaders tended to blame the Islamist regime in the north for nearly all their woes. This was the central myth. The northern armies had been brutal; they had stirred up ethnic discontent and supported rival southern militias. Most of the southern travails since 2005 were largely self-inflicted due to bad governance, however.

  During the independence celebrations, with the UN secretary general in attendance, some southerners suggested arresting Omar al-Bashir, and handing him over to The Hague. That would have kick-started another war. The resumption of war – which Juba’s new government was desperate to avoid – was still possible, especially if the bloody border disputes continued to fester. Khartoum, however, was likely to be pre-occupied with conflicts in Darfur, though it would not cede oil-rich Abyei without a big fight. Even if Khartoum did behave over the border disputes, and didn’t make life too hard for its neighbour – not least because of the need to share oil – Juba looked set to create chaos all on its own. Just as Mugabe’s regime blamed all its ills on foreigners instead of rectifying its own domestic follies, so too Juba developed the habit of blaming everything on Khartoum. Corruption, tribalism, military overspending, and autocratic one-party rule threatened South Sudan with another Eritrea or, worse, Somalia. This would justify African leaders’ nervousness about secession.

  Many of the SPLA leaders were good commanders, though some were feeble politicians. Too much power had been pulled into the centre, with precious little development or authority in the regions. Much of the
war was about marginalization, yet this still persisted. The SPLA/M government – only a small opposition had been elected in the national and state parliaments – needed to stop scapegoating Khartoum and start putting its own house in order. Domestic security was much more important than border security. It was very easy to blame all domestic woes on ‘tribalism’. The internal fighting was as much intra-tribal as inter-tribal. Security would be difficult while so many citizens were armed. Attempts to disarm local militias often made things worse, however, as everyone complained about their own disarmament, while claiming that rival groups were allowed to keep their guns. Many of the domestic fights had nothing to do with tribe, but all to do with politics, local grudges or access to resources in drought areas. Cattle-raiding by well-armed gangs of young men, often beholden to no authority, and frustrated, literally, by the surge in bride prices, were often the cause of friction, frequently outside the control of a tribal or clan base. Sometimes disgruntled local SPLA commanders co-opted these lawless bands.

  The solution to marginalization did suggest more local autonomy, yet this fed ethnic cronyism. On the other hand, over-centralized control in Juba smacked of military authoritarianism. This was the development paradox that Juba and many other African states faced. Professor Tim Allen, of the London School of Economics, headed a large research team during the build-up to independence. His report, Southern Sudan at Odds with Itself, indicated that the main peace dividends expected were ‘personal security and access to resources’.3 Certainly, the usual squabbling and disharmony among the numerous layers of international aid from the UN and NGOs caused problems, said Professor Allen. But his main conclusion was that Juba had to put its own affairs in order. Even if northern Sudan did not, in extremis, invade to seize the oilfields, South Sudan had to energize every resource to escape being a failed state.