JOIN USWith the people of the southern part of Sudan overwhelmingly voting for independence, the stage is now set for the partition of the country. Though the outcome is yet to be officially announced, the conditions of 60 per cent voter turnout and peaceful polling, watched by international observers, having been met, the almost 100 per cent endorsement for independence should ensure that the new country is born in the next few months.
Sudan is Africa’s largest country and the tenth largest in the world and therefore its division is an important event. The African Union, which has always opposed the division of the continent’s countries, has accepted the need for Sudan’s division because of special reasons. The most important is the terrible civil war which took a toll of over two million lives and caused displacement of much more numbers.
The war between the Arab and Muslim north and the animist, Christian and black south has raged for over 50 years since the country gained independence from Britain in 1956. Apart from race and religion, political and economic reasons also widened the gulf between the two parts. Power was wielded from the capital Khartoum in the north while the oil-rich south felt it was exploited. Both sides are equally poor and undeveloped, with the whole country having only about 100 km of asphalted roads, and absolutely no educational, health, development or law and order infrastructure.
The suppression of the south by the north, with the racial cleansing in Darfur as its most sordid expression, had invited international outrage and the president, Omar al-Bashir, has been indicted by the International Criminal Court in the Hague for crimes against humanity. The referendum, which was decided on in 2005 to end the civil war, might now help both sides to go their separate ways.
But the road ahead is not easy either. The boundaries have to be marked, debts and assets have to be divided and there are likely to be disputes over the status of some oil-rich areas. China has made huge investments in oil. India too has some stakes. The international community should ensure that the troops amassed by both sides on the border do not clash on any provocation. A peaceful and orderly partition process is essential for the two sides and for countries which have economic interests there.