Geographical location of Fashoda in South Sudan | Credit | Courtesy

SPLM-IO will soon hold a conference in Fashoda to resolve the disagreement over the appointment of Johnson Olony as the governor of Upper Nile State, its chairman has said.

Dr. Riek Machar, who is also the country’s first vice president, announced this at the closure of the 6^th SPLM/SPLA-IO national conference in Juba on Saturday.

“We will go to Malakal because we want to go and hold a conference in Fashoda to address other issues there so that Upper Nile maybe like other states that enjoy the benefits of peace,” Dr. Machar told the participants.

In June 2020, President Salva Kiir appointed nine state governors, but the SPLM-IO nominee for Upper Nile has yet to be appointed.

The SPLM-IO had said it submitted the name of General Johnson Olony as its preferred nominee for the Upper Nile gubernatorial post.

But Kiir’s office described Olony as an “active soldier who has not fully subjected himself to the political developments in Juba, and is not “within territories that are controlled by SPLM-IO or by the government”.

But Dr. Riek Machar’s office dismissed the claim, saying Olony is “a general in the SPLA-IO which is a recognized army”.