‘South Sudan needs more than 6 months to form interim government’-President
South Sudan President Salva Kiir now says the formation of a unity government should be delayed by at least a year, despite a May 12 deadline in a September peace agreement that ended the civil war.
According to Kiir, the government has been unable to disarm, house, train and integrate the country’s various forces since the deal had been signed, and rejected a suggestion by former rebel leader Riek Machar that the new government be formed in six months.
He said the postponement came at Machar’s request, but said the rainy season would make it hard to accomplish the integration of their forces within six months.
“Instead of six months, let us call for one year, because from May up to November, there will be rain still and you cannot move with a car to any location,” Kiir said in his speech. “We can form the government by April or May.”
The September agreement followed a string of failed peace deals, but has largely held so far, despite both parties missing key deadlines
Machar’s military spokesman denied the recruiting accusation, saying they only were sending envoys to communities to discuss the peace deal.
“Our chief of general staff and his commanders are for peace not war,” Lam Paul Gabriel, the acting spokesman for Machar’s rebels, said by phone from Addis Ababa on Wednesday. “Peace dissemination is what is being misunderstood as recruitment.”
Around 400,000 people died during South Sudan’s five-year civil war, which broke out in 2013 between forces loyal to Machar – then vice president – and Kiir.
