By Our Correspondent,
Juba SOUTH SUDAN
South Sudan President,
Salva Kiir, has finally picked Gen. Hussein Abdelbagi Akol as his fifth deputy
on the opposition alliance ticket, ending days of speculation.
South Sudan President, Salva Kiir shaking hands with the fifth Vice-President, Gen. Hussein Abdelbagi Akol |
The post was
left vacant by Kiir on Friday after members of the South Sudan Opposition
Alliance (SSOA), an umbrella grouping of eight opposition parties, failed to
select one candidate for the vice president position.
Members of
the opposition alliance had nominated six leaders from their various political
organizations for the post and authorized President Kiir to pick one of the
candidates.
The move was
rejected by National Democratic Movement (NDM), a member of the opposition
coalition. It said that the choice of a position belonging to the opposition
alliance cannot be made by another party to the peace deal.
Khalid
Butrous, a member of the opposition coalition and head of the National
Salvation Front faction, told reporters here this afternoon that the president
has appointed Gen. Hussein Abdelbagi as his fifth deputy as part of the peace
deal.
“We met
today in the presence of President Salva Kiir and Sudan’s leader Gen. Abdel
Fattah Al-Burhan. We agreed at the meeting to authorize the president to pick one
of candidates on the list,” he said.
The
opposition official said they welcome the appointment of Gen. Hussein Abdelbagi
as the fifth vice president of the transitional government of national unity.
“The
president has already issued a decree appointing Gen. Hussein Abdelbagi as the
vice president. Hussein has already been sworn-in as vice president at the
presidential palace,” he explained.
Gen. Hussein
abdelbagi hails from Northern Bahr el Ghazal State.
According to the revitalized peace agreement, the First
Vice President will oversee the Governance Cluster while the four
vice-presidents will supervise Economic Cluster, Services Delivery Cluster,
Infrastructure Cluster and Gender and Youth Cluster.
The cluster of every one of the four vice-presidents will
be determined in a meeting chaired by President Salva Kiir.
The SPLA Brigadier General Hussein Abdelbagi Akol Agany had
defected in March 2016 and joint a rebel faction loyal to the late Peter Gadet
Yak.
However, he joined the South Sudan Patriotic Movement of
Costello Garang Ring Lual and appeared with him during the preparatory meetings
of the High-Level Revitalization Forum (HLRF) in October 2017.
Stephen Lual Garang, the SSOA deputy spokesman, told Sudan
Tribune that the other leaders of the alliance Josephine Joseph Lagu, Lam Akol,
Joseph Bangasi Bakasoro, Khalid Butrous and Gabriel Changson will be consoled
with the ministerial positions allocated to the alliance.
The SSOA has three ministerial portfolios and a deputy
minister.
Khalid revealed that the opposition alliance will submit
the final list of its ministerial nominees on Monday for their appointment into
the cabinet. “We are planning to meet so that we agree on the nominees,” he
concluded.
President Kiir on Friday dissolved the previous government
and appointed opposition leader Riek Machar as first vice president, after the
two men finally agreed to form a long-delayed unity government.
James Wani
Igga, Taban Deng Gai, and Rebecca Nyandeng De Mabior were also named
vice-presidents as part of the unity government. - Africa
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