SPLM Chairman Salva Kiir has sent a delegation of four party members to the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa to meet with the ‘group of seven’ SPLM leaders who have formed the third bloc opposition group within the party.
The delegation is not coming to take part directly in the peace talks between the South Sudanese government and the SPLM/A opposition faction led by Riek Machar, but rather to participate in intra-party negotiations facilitated by the ruling parties of Ethiopia and South Africa.
This initiative was announced last month but met with delays. It was initially described as an intra-party reconciliation initiative involving a meeting of Political Bureau members in Addis Ababa.
Akol Paul, a member of the delegation and member of the SPLM Political Bureau, told Radio Tamazuj that the delegation will negotiate with the recently released SPLM-G7 group on political issues, not governmental affairs. He said that Jemma Nunu Kumba was the head of the four person delegation.
The group of seven, which includes the Political Bureau members Deng Alor and John Luk, was detained from mid December to late January before being released on the demand of the IGAD mediation.
Yesterday the G7 issued a statement slamming the South Sudanese government delegation for stalling the progress of peace talks.
The main negotiations between the government and the armed opposition faction stopped since yesterday after the two sides failed to sign the declaration of principles document and agenda that had been agreed upon earlier.
Mediators reportedly insisted that the SPLM-G7 be allowed to join in the signing of the Declaration of Principles, but the government objected vigorously.
However, Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn has asked the delegations to the negotiations not to leave the country until his return from abroad, in order to meet with the parties.
File photo: Salva Kiir Mayardit