Civil society groups deliberating on the national permanent constitution in 2011 [©Gurtong]
By Waakhe Simon Wudu
JUBA, 16th January 2012 [Gurtong] - South Sudan Civil Society Groups are demanding for their democratic right of inclusion in the national constitutional review process announced by the government a week ago.
While addressing a meeting of political parties in Juba early this month, the Vice President of South Sudan Dr. Riek Machar announced the establishment of a South Sudan Permanent Constitution Review Commission.
The civil society activists drawn from various South Sudanese organizations expressed unfairness in the way the civil society has been represented while criticizing the process to have been undemocratic and unfair.
Gurtong leant from one activists, Lillian Riziq, the Chief Executive Officer of the South Sudan Women’s Empowerment Network (SSWEN) that South Sudan has established the committee to start drafting work of the national permanent constitution.
According to Lillian, the committee is comprised of 15 political parties with the ruling party, Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) taking the lion share, some opposition parties and the civil society. She however stressed that there is unfair representation of the civil society.
SPLM had only appointed one civil society activist, Mr. Samuel Dong. “Is Dong fit to represent the whole civil society? including only one activist is unfair,” Lillian complained.
There are 42 members that make up the committee with Dong as the only activist to represent the vast civil society group in the country. “This is unfair due to the fact that none of the women activists was elected to represent the committee,” Lillian added.
“Dong is the right person to represent the civil society, I am confident of him being a lawyer but my concern is none of the women who are part of the civil society is appointed to represent women interests in the committee,” Lilian said.
She added that this representation is a complete violation to the South Sudan Transitional Constitution as it does not justify the 25% of the women representation in the committee.
Meanwhile Edmond Yakani, an activist and Coordinator of the Community Empowerment for Progress Organization, (CEPO) said that, the South Sudan government has always handpicked some popular politicians to represent the civil society in playing national duties.
He said these “handpicked” politicians disguised as “civil society activists” do not represent the interest of the civil society groups. He urged the activists to be given room to elect their representatives.
“In the process of getting civil society representation, CEPO calls upon your leadership to allow the family of South Sudan civil society organizations to nominate their candidates than getting representation through handpicked individuals that are not according to the consent of the South Sudan civil society organization family,” Yakani urged the selection team.
“During the transitional constitution making processes, the civil society organizations were represented by "handpicked" famous South Sudanese politicians. CEPO hope that similar mistake should not be repeated,” he added.
Prior to the review of the then Southern Sudan Interim Constitution which is now the South Sudan National Transitional Constitution, SPLM was accused by both the opposition parties and the civil society of undemocratically setting up the review of the constitution process.
The process was then characterized by walk-out of many of the opposition parties in the review process including Peter Abdurrahman Sule, the then leader of the United Democratic Front, (UDF) who later took to the bush to rebel against the SPLM government.