South Sudan: The difficult road to peacebuilding

Since the last phase of the armed conflict in South Sudan broke out in December 2013, caused by disagreements within the ruling party that resulted in clashes between factions loyal to President Salva Kiir (SPLA) and those of then Vice President Riek Machar (SPLA-IO), the country has been embroiled in a bloody civil war that has generated around 400,00 fatalities and more than 2 million people forcibly displaced by violence, making it, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the largest refugee crisis in Africa and the third largest in the world after Syria and Afghanistan. Although a Peace Agreement was reached in August 2015, through significant pressure from the international community, the belligerence and lack of commitment of the parties has made it impossible to end the violence and consolidate peace in the world's youngest nation, which achieved independence in 2011. 

In September 2018 the government and the SPLA-IO rebels reconfirmed their commitment to peace by signing the Revitalized Agreement on Conflict Resolution in the Republic of Southern Sudan (R-ARCSS).  This agreement restored the foundations of the 2015 Peace Agreement, and established a series of commitments, including the creation of an eight-month pre-transition period to form a transitional coalition government by May 2019, which is a precondition for free elections in 2022. However, in May this objective was not achieved, and the parties, mediated by the African regional group, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) - which serves as the main mediating actor - agreed to extend the transition period by six months, until 12 November 2019. The extension of the time was due to the inability to resolve fundamental aspects prior to the formation of the expected unity government, among whose main unresolved issues are the construction of the unified army, aspects related to security control in the capital, Juba, to facilitate the return to the country of Riek Machar (exiled in Sudan) or the issue related to the establishment of the number of states and their territorial limits. Once again, however, the deadline was not met, and at the end of October Kiir and Machar again requested a further extension of the transition deadlines, arguing that conditions were not adequate and that the formation of a government could jeopardise the agreed ceasefire. On 7 November, at an emergency summit held in Uganda under the mediation of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, the Chairman of the Sovereign Council of Sudan, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and Kenya's envoy, Kalonzo Musyoka, Kiir and Machar agreed to a further extension of the 100-day deadline, now set for 22 February 2020.

The main difficulties for the formation of the desired transitional government refer to the discrepancies between the security aspects and the administrative division of the country. With regard to the first point, progress has been made with the assumption of agreements by the parties on the formation of a protection unit responsible for providing security to government officials in Juba during the transition period, as well as the creation of another special unit, called the Republican Guards, which will be responsible for protecting opposition leaders. At the same time, it was agreed to make progress on the establishment of the Disarmament, Demobilization and Rehabilitation Commission (DDR), which is not yet operational, and which provides for the formation of an armed force of 83,000 soldiers. However, the progress is still far from being translated into effective confidence and security measures that will make Riek Machar and the members of the SPLA-IO return to Juba to form the transitional government.

On the other hand, little progress has been made in resolving the controversial issue of the administrative division of the territory and the location of state boundaries. This aspect is the most critical to break the deadlock between the parties, since the existing discrepancies on the number and territorial limits of the states, are framed in a complex logic of power distribution of the two factions. Without progress in this area, there is little chance of prospering in the consolidation of peace in the country. Before the onset of the civil war, Southern Sudan was made up of 10 states, where state governors had substantial power in terms of access to resources and influence over political appointments down to the local level. Such state boundaries are very important in a country deeply divided on the basis of ethnic and political affiliations, as they can determine which ethnic group dominates each state and benefits from its resources, including oil. Before the war began, Riek Machar had demanded a redistribution of 21 states, based on ethnic lines, to facilitate the governance of both factions in the country. However, the Salva Kiir government carried out a reconfiguration, first of 28 states, and later expanded to 32, which favored its political base and generated strong disagreements in some states allied to Machar that saw the new administrative-territorial distribution reduce their power and distribute their lands to other groups.

Although both the African Union (AU) Peace and Security Council, IGAD and the Troika (US, Norway and UK) are putting pressure on the parties with sanctions to address the outstanding issues and form the desired transitional government, so far with the talks, it does not seem that in the next few days, a true agreement will be reached that will give way to a new transitional phase that will bring the stability and peace that the population so desires. To all this must be added the emergence of new irregular armed actors who do not recognize the factions of Salva Kiir and Riek Machar as valid interlocutors in the construction of peace and, therefore, have not ratified the peace agreement maintaining the war, mainly in the region of Equatoria. Organizations such as the National Salvation Front (NAS) led by Thomas Cirillo, the People's Democratic Movement (PDM) led by Hakim Dario or the group led by former Southern Sudanese General Paul Malong, Southern Sudan United Front (SSUF/A), represent new threats that make it difficult to end the violence in the country.