Sudan says no dual-citizenship for southerners
* Article
* Comments (6)
email Email
print Print
pdfSave
separation
increase
decrease
separation
separation
*
*
*
*
July 17, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – Sudan’s governing National Congress Party
(NCP) has reaffirmed refusal to granting dual-citizenship to Southern
Sudanese, in contrast with pledges by South Sudan to grant citizenship
to northern Sudanese.
JPEG - 10.4 kb
NCP’s media secretary Ibrahim Gandur (FILE)
Citizenship is among a raft of issues being discussed between north
and South Sudan in an effort to disengage the two countries after the
south became independent on 9 July.
South Sudan president Salva Kiir announced on 10 July that his country
is prepared to grant citizenship to northerners in the south,
expressing hope that the northern government would do likewise.
However, northern officials maintained that southerners in the north
would not be allowed to become citizens. Khartoum already terminated
the employment of southern Sudanese in the government and the
military.
This month the Sudanese cabinet approved changes to the immigration
law which would automatically strip all Southerners of their
citizenship though it is not clear how this would be practically
implemented.
Explaining the government’s refusal to grant dual citizenship to
southerners, NCP’s spokesman Ibrashim Gandur, cited the high
percentage of south Sudanese’s vote in favor of secession as well as
what he termed as the SPLM’s quest to monopolize the south’s resources
while leaving its citizens to stay in the north.
According to Gandur, if southerners are given citizenship, seven
million of them would remain in the north while the SPLM acquire the
region’s resources with a population as few as 2m.
Many southerners fled to the north during the more than two-decade of
north-south civil wars which raged mainly in the south and devastated
the region. The war ended with the signing of the Comprehensive Peace
Agreement in 2005.
The NCP official further said that the issue of dual-citizenship would
be sorted out as soon as borders between the two countries are
established and the nature of bilateral relationship are known.
(ST)
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "JFD
info" group.
To post to this group, send email to [email protected].
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
[email protected].
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/jfdinfo?hl=en.
