President Kiir and his deputies after the swearing in ceremony at the State House on 22 February 20202 | Credit | Ministry ICT & Postal Services

The purported resolutions of the Presidency on the sharing of States is a violation of the revitalized peace agreement, a political analyst has said.

Last week, President Salva Kiir said the decision was made in a meeting attended by all his deputies, including SPLM-IO Leader Dr. Riek Machar.

In the resolution seen by Eye Radio, the Presidency agreed to allocate Central Equatoria, Eastern Equatoria, Lakes, Warrap, Northern Bahr el-Ghazal, and Unity states to the incumbent government.

While Jonglei, Western Bahr el-Ghazal, and Western Equatorial states shall go to the main opposition group, SPLM-IO.

Upper Nile State was allocated to the South Sudan Opposition Alliance.

But Dr. Machar rejected the decision, saying President Kiir unilaterally made it, not through a consensus.

Leaders of the Other Political Parties have also rejected the resolution.

Dr. James Okuk – a political analyst has criticized the resolution saying the allocation of the states should be agreed upon by the five parties to the revitalized peace agreement, but not the presidency.

“There is no single mandate in article 1.9 that authorize the presidency to allocate the number of states, it is not there,” Dr. Okuk said.

“The only mandate assigned to them is for them to appoint governors in the states or to relieve governors but not really to allocate which state goes to which party.”

“It is not the work of the presidency and this has been brought out very clearly in article 1.16.4 which says very clearly that the parties shall share the responsibility of the states in accordance to the relative prominence of each one of them on the ground, it did not say the presidency.”

The 2018 revitalized peace deal notes that, in sharing state and local government positions, the parties shall take into account the relative prominence each party has in the respective state or county.

Dr. James Okuk urges the parties to make more compromises instead of always referring matters to the monitoring bodies or the region.

“My advice is that let them stick to the text of the agreement and also to the spirit of the agreement, the spirit of the agreement is a partnership,” said the political analyst.

“They should not conspire against each other because that one will not help with the implementation of the agreement.

“They should work as partners who are ready and who commit themselves to implement the peace agreement as they have solemnly declared in the preamble of the agreement.”

“If they find themselves that they have difficulty, they should not waste time, they should immediately contact the R-JMEC and let R-JMEC come in to help them.”

“If they do not agree with what the R-JMEC say let them say let IGAD come in as the arbitrator and whatever the IGAD says that’s what will go,” Dr. Okuk concluded.

The disagreements over the allocation of states to peace parties have been delaying the full establishment of the full coalition government.

The IGAD Council of Ministers last month gave the peace parties up to early this month to agree and complete the formation of the coalition government.