The Sudanese ambassador to South Sudan, accompanied by his staff, visited retired Anyanya war veteran and politician Joseph Lagu at his residence in Juba.
Speaking to Radio Tamazuj during the visit on Tuesday, Sudan’s Ambassador to South Sudan, Jamal Abdel-Majid: said: “It is a pleasure to visit and meet retired general and former Sudanese vice president, Joseph Lagu as the Sudanese embassy. It was a very good social visit, and we found him in good health.”
“We are happy and thank the family for the warm welcome. Joseph Lagu is a national leader who served in Sudan and contributed a lot to the history of Sudan; that is why we came to visit him in his residence,” he added.
According to the Sudanese diplomat, the embassy has a plan tin place visit to prominent South Sudanese leaders who held national positions before South Sudan’s independence.
Speaking on behalf of the family, Josephine Joseph Lagu said: “I am very, very pleased on behalf of the family of retired general Joseph Lagu to receive the Sudanese ambassador to Juba, to our home. The Ambassador had come with the embassy staff to pay a courtesy call on our father, who was a national figure and held national positions when the country was still one,” she said.
“And indeed, one of the first questions our father asked was how is our beloved country, Sudan? That shows how he is still very affectionate to Sudan and the people of Sudan, and he has expressed interest in visiting Sudan. We are very happy with the visit,” Josephine said.
Who is Joseph Lagu?
Joseph Lagu was born in 1931 in a hamlet known as Momokwe in Moli, northern Ma’di, about 120 km from Juba. He is from the Ma’di community of Eastern Equatoria state.
Lagu received his primary and secondary education in Malek and Rumbek, respectively. He was accepted to study law at the University of Khartoum but chose to join the Military College in Omdurman, Khartoum, where he graduated in May 1960.
He was commissioned as an officer in the Sudanese army and posted to the 10th Brigade, Northern Command from where he was selected to attend Sandhurst military academy in the United Kingdom. He declined the offer and instead defected from the Sudanese army to join the South Sudan resistance movement.
In 1963, he became leader of the resistance movement and renamed it Anyanya, after a deadly poison. Anyanya gave a new lease of life to the first Sudanese civil war, which started with the Torit mutiny in 1955 and ended in 1972 (dubbed the 17 years war). Among his junior officers was John Garang de Mabior, who was recruited in 1970 and was later to spearhead the second Sudanese civil war under the banner of the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/SPLA).
In 1972, Joseph Lagu signed the Addis Ababa Agreement with Gaafar Nimeiry, President of Sudan, under the auspices of His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie.
The Addis Ababa deal granted regional autonomy to Southern Sudan. Joseph Lagu re-joined the Sudanese armed forces with the rank of Major General with responsibility for the smooth merger of the disparate armed forces. The ten years following the agreement was the longest period of relative peace in Sudan’s tumultuous history. It gave Southern Sudan a chance to establish its own autonomous democratic institutions.
In 1978, after leaving military service, Joseph Lagu entered public life and was elected by popular vote to the Presidency of the High Executive Council. In 1982, he was appointed second Vice President of Sudan.
In 1983, President Nimeiry unilaterally abrogated the Addis Ababa agreement, and in 1985 after Nimeiry’s government was toppled by a coup d’état, Joseph Lagu relocated to the United Kingdom.
In 1989, he was appointed a roving Ambassador of Sudan by the then Prime Minister, Sadiq el Mahdi and continued in this role when Omar al-Bashir took over power. From 1990 to 1992, Joseph Lagu held the position of Permanent Representative of Sudan to the UN in New York, after which he remained a roving ambassador.
Lagu also served as Kiir’s advisor.
In 2006, he completed writing his memoires, Sudan Odyssey through a state from Ruin to Hope.