SUDAN: South Sudan's President Salva Kiir begins his campaign ahead of the presidential elections set for April

Record ID: 1530468

  • Title: SUDAN: South Sudan's President Salva Kiir begins his campaign ahead of the presidential elections set for April
  • Date: 26th February 2010
  • Summary: PEOPLE DANCING
  • Embargoed: 13th March 2010 09:42
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Sudan
  • Country: Sudan
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA5C47K43ANODQ82BJQT5WDGT8R
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: South Sudan's President Salva Kiir toured the capital of South Sudan, Juba, on the back of a pickup truck on Wednesday (February 24) as he launched his election campaign with a pledge to stamp out corruption.
    Sudan is preparing for April presidential and legislative elections, set up under a 2005 peace accord that also promised South Sudan a referendum in 2011 on whether to split off as an independent country.
    Kiir is the head of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), former southern rebels who now dominate south Sudan's semi-autonomous government appointed after the peace deal.
    He addressed a crowd of cheering supporters in Juba on Wednesday.
    "I have only one challenger and I don't think that this challenger is from south Sudan's political parties," Kiir said in a reference to Lam Akol who is from the southern Shiluk tribe and is also contesting the same seat as him.
    Akol's party SPLM-Democratic Change has been treated with suspicion by some southerners who see him as closely aligned with the north. Akol has said that his members have been harassed in the south.
    Kiir told a crowd of supporters he would eradicate corruption.
    "If I am elected and come back I think things will be different from what has been happening for the last five years," he said.
    Many southerners have become frustrated at the slow process of development and perceived corruption in their oil-producing region since the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement ended two decades of civil war between Sudan's Muslim north and the south, where most follow Christianity and traditional beliefs.
    Kiir decided to run for the top position in the south, choosing a more junior member of the SPLM Yasir Arman to compete for the presidency for the whole of Sudan.
    Many analysts have seen the move as a sign the SPLM is more interested in consolidating its position in the south before an expected independence vote in the referendum than in taking on the whole country.
    Kiir is widely expected to win the southern vote and supporters have covered Juba in campaign posters showing Kiir looking skywards next to the slogan "vision and mission".
    SPLM supporters at the rally were confident about the election.
    "We need the president of southern Sudan to become the president again," said Juba resident, James Atak.
    "With Kiir at the top of SPLM, all will be a landslide because we have a programme to execute, peace stability, referendum," said Beka Wan Deng.
    Kiir also announced that the current vice-president of south Sudan, Riek Machar, will maintain his position if Kiir was elected president.
    Machar, now a senior member of the SPLM, broke away from the insurgent movement during the war, causing a tribal rift that led to thousands of deaths.
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