جبال النوبة...ضمير السودان الغائب..

Quote: In two years there will be elections, followed by a popular consultation that could give the possibility to adapt the protocols for the Nuba Mountains. Yes, after the elections there will be this popular consultation. And the popular consultation, if you go about it very carefully, could be even better than self-determination, because the people can include self-determination. You can make amendments to the agreement, you can add things, you can reduce others. In a way it is better than self-determination and it comes with the choice of the people. By the way, it was not only the brothers of the North who rejected self-determination. It is a general trend globally. The recommendations of the countries here and there - they were not encouraging it. Even the self-determination for the South was only accepted because it would solve a problem that has been going on for such a long time. Otherwise it is not a trend in the international community. Now, people are gathering and joining rather than making new nations - but that is another story of course. You are implying that the mediating countries… ... were not very interested in self-determination for the Nuba. Through popular consultation we can decide for ourselves what we want the protocols to be, even including self-determination. But the task is how to let our people understand this exactly; focussing on what we are going to do with the popular consultation; what are the loopholes in the agreement; how can we best improve it? After the elections we will see whether we use the agreement as it is, or whether we add to it, or whether we throw it out. Keeping in mind that the interest of the people of the Nuba Mountains must be our first concern. This is our task now. Now is the time! It needs a clear majority in the parliament to amend the protocols. Yes, of course, it needs a majority for the SPLM in the Nuba Mountains and the same SPLM in the centre here. To amend the protocols, it needs a dialogue between the State parliament and the national Government of that day. It needs - well, even if it doesn't come to be like that… That is just our hope now. But is it doesn't happen, if we don't win the elections and we don't have a majority in parliament - what if… I think nobody knows. I myself, if it had been my wish, I had not signed this protocol. It does not meet my aspirations, what I have worked for, what I fought for, for all these years. We also couldn't get everything that we wanted for our people because of the situation that was engulfing the peace talks. There was a human tragedy in Sudan in general which began, with the influx of refugees here and there, to affect the security of the neighbouring countries. The world community here and there, The UN, the US… it was a MUST that the agreement should be signed in a way or another. At some point there were no good reasons to say: "if you don't give me fifty-fifty percent, we'll go back to war; we'll take up the gun." If they had refused it, it meant you had to go back - there would have been nobody behind you. The international community, the region: "Oh, they have to return to the negotiating table, they must achieve peace - by al means." So we were pressurised here and there. We hadn't defeated the Government; the Government hadn't defeated us, so there was this spirit of give and take and what and what. But still I can say the protocol of the Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile was unfair, and it needs a lot of work to improve it.