By Bior Aquilla

Civil society activists in South Sudan are calling for the integration of outstanding provisions of the 2018 Revitalised Peace Agreement with the outcomes of the Tumaini [hope] Peace Initiative. They believe this merger is essential to ensure a successful and stable transition for the country.

Edmund Yakani, the Executive Director of Community Empowerment for Progress Organization (CEPO), told Classic FM that he believes that merging these two agreements is the only way to guarantee the success of the Tumaini initiative. This comes at a time when the parties in the mediation talks have taken contrasting positions. 

The government has proposed that the Tumaini outcome be annexed to the 2018 peace agreement, while the opposition is advocating for an entirely new agreement.

“My proposal is that the middle ground for Tumaini to succeed is now for us to move to the stage of merger, we need to merge the pending tasks of R-ARCSS and with new merging ideas from tumaini. We need to merge them together to create an implementable political framerwork for transition the country from political instability to stability,” said Yakani.

Ter Manyang Gatwech, Executive Director for the Center for Peace and Advocacy (CPA), also expressed support for the merger. He reiterated that the inclusion of new actors would create renewed enthusiasm for implementing the agreement.

“Those who stayed out for a long time they will have an appetite in terms of implementation of the peace. They will not be like these people here who stayed in for a long time, I think they will have appetite to speed up implementation of the peace agreement,”  Gatwech stated.

There is growing concern among citizens that the 2018 revitalised peace agreement may not achieve its goals within the remaining timeframe since many tasks including the complete implementation of the security arrangements, are still pending.

Despite these concerns, Merekaje Lorna, a human rights defender and civil rights activist, believes that the Tumaini Initiative is an opportunity to promote inclusivity for women in the peace process.

“Now that Tumaini Initative is another avenue, we see it as an opportunity and we hope that after reaching an agreement through the Tumaini process, at least the governance of this country will include women,” said Lorna.

She however raised concern over the unity government’s silence on the progress of the implementation of the agreement, stating that this may result in another extension of the transitional period, which would negatively impact the people of South Sudan.

She also highlighted on the need for a merger between the Tumaini Initiative and R-ARCSS, and the possible benefits of such a merger. Merekaje however cautioned politicians opposing the merger of the two deals.

“I agree with my colleagues who are saying that there has to be a merger. Some people and especially the politicians in the RTGONU are saying that Tumaini should be a stand alone document. We know the challenges with that; one there will be gaps in implementations number two it will be difficult to shuffle between different documents number three there is high risk of omission,” she said adding, “But the merger that my colleagues are talking about, that many of us are talking about is actually to develop a hybrid document that picks the outstanding provisions of R-ARCSS and then sequence and weave it together with the new thinking that is coming up in the tumaini discussions. If we do that then it will be easy for us to have clarity of direction and where we are going with implementation.”

Many South Sundanese are hoping that the peace implementation will be successful and the country will go for the December 2026 scheduled general elections.

Vicky, a female resident of Munuki Block C, a suburb in Juba, said after returning to Juba from a refugee camp in Uganda in 2016, she hopes that elections will be peaceful to enable her complete her education without sudden breaks.

“My family was displaced by the 2016 war and to Uganda in the refugee camp and I studied there. I came back [to South Sudan] two years ago and i’m working . I do hope the elections do take place next year, but also in a peaceful way, I mean no violence or war comes out as a result of the election. Because I am planning to further my education and I would like to complete it without having breaks or going for breaks because of the war,” said Vicky.

There are growing calls for South Sudanese leaders to demonstrate political will and finalize the remaining tasks to prevent further delays or an extension of the transitional period.

This story is reported with a grant from Journalists for Human Rights under the ‘tackling mis/disinformation project’ funded by the peace and stabilization program of the government of Canada.