Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa’s address to media at the Juba Airport on conclusion of his visit to South Sudan
Transcript
You are very kind Vice President James Wani Igga, it is a real joy and pleasure to be here at the airport as you send us off. As you all know we have spent a few days here in Juba having brought back the former detainees back home. We can only characterise their return home as giant and brave step towards building peace in South Sudan. They were very courageous, they were very brave to have taken this step in terms of implementing the Arusha Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) Reunification Agreement.
As you all know we did decide, in fact the leaders of Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Africa felt very strongly that one of the important steps towards building peace in South Sudan was to reunify the party the SPLM and in this regard the Arusha Agreement was then crafted and agreed to and signed in October of last year.
Following the signature of that agreement a number of steps need to be embarked upon to implement it and this was one of those steps. The home coming of the five former detainees was a very important part of the whole process of building peace as well as reunifying the SPLM. They came as an advance team, meaning that there is going to be a follow up and a follow on.
What we envisage happening in the next coming weeks is that there will be further consultation and there will be a return of the other leaders of the SPLM both constituting part of the former detainees and hopefully, this we will very work hard for, of Riek Machar SPLM in opposition. We can bring the three together and we are determined to do it, we will then have really made a gigantic move in building peace in South Sudan.
I want to conclude by saying the meetings we had yesterday were historic in their nature, they were impactful in terms of their substance, they were really meetings of beginning the process of reunifying the party in terms of their organisational impact.
We had thorough-going briefings and meetings with SPLM Extended National Liberation Council. they met and President Salva Kirr was there and the five former detainees were also in place. We had honest discussions and really thorough-going discussions. We believe that following on this past few days we built a very good firm foundation for the peace process to now move ahead. We want to move with speed, we want to move with determination and this we are determined to do all of us working together.
And lastly the peace that we intend to build here is the task of the South Sudanese leadership and the people of South Sudan. No one else can build peace in South Sudan other than the leadership of the SPLM. So SPLM has a big responsibility on its shoulder to build peace. What we have seen here is the clear determination that everybody wants to build peace and we believe that we will move ahead with the support of the leaders here and I would like to thank Vice President James Wani Igga for seeing me off. I saw him briefly in Nairobi and now I see you again and he is also briefed me and I briefed him as well.
I would like to thank President Salva Kirr and the other leaders in the SPLM and Deng Alor Kuol and the other four former detainees. This has gone well and the Acting Secretary of the SPLM Dr Anne Itto has been very helpful in making our stay here very good and also in processing the organisational aspect of our meetings that we held.
Thank you very much.
Question
My name is Basil Buga Nyama of the Equator Broadcasting Corporation
Thank you for accompanying the former SPLM detainees. How would you rate this visit in the process towards finding lasting solution to the conflict?
Answer
As I said in my input, this was a really gigantic step towards consolidating peace here in South Sudan. The former detainees demonstrated courage, bravery, but more importantly commitment to the peace process here In South Sudan. We applaud them for having taken the risk. It was a calculated risk on their part, but also for having had faith, deep faith in South Sudan and in the people of South Sudan and leadership of the SPLM here. We applaud them for that because they were not afraid, they knew that they were coming home, so their coming home has built a real good and firm foundation for us to be able to move forward.
But what has also been consolidated in the foundation is the willingness of the SPLM leadership here in Juba in South Sudan to accept them back, to bring them back home and to show that they are determined to build unity and to work with them in the interest of the People of South Sudan.
Question (Basil Buga Nyama of the Equator Broadcasting Corporation)
And the Arusha meeting is part of the greater IGAD peace talks, how is this feeding into the IGAD peace talks?
Answer
The Arusha Reunification Agreement is meant to look at the intra-party relationship, how we can begin the process of repairing what became damaged within the SPLM which everyone accept.
Everyone accept that if we are to build peace in South Sudan we must focus on the party itself. The party has to work properly, it has to restructure itself, it has to have an ideological perspective of where it wants to take the country, it has to have a clear vision. Many of those things are in place, they just need to be put together.
Now Arusha [Agreement] is important for the way the party will lead the peace process and the development agenda of South Sudan. IGAD is another process and we agreed that the two are complimentary, they are not in competition with one another, they should be seen as being complementary working together to restore peace, to restore harmony and to build a very strong foundation on which the people of Sudan can develop their country.
Thank you very much.
