Citizenship issue festers as Sudan prepares for plebiscite

With less than five months to the referendum in Southern Sudan, the sensitive issue of citizenship should the South vote to secede is yet to be resolved.

There are fears that Southerners in the North and Northerners in the South could be left stateless and vulnerable to attacks should there be a split.

Both the National Congress Party (NCP) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) are currently grappling with the issue of citizenship, given that there are thousands — if not millions — of Southerners in the North who are not interested in relocating should the South secede.

During the 22 years of war, many displaced Southerners settled in the north and their children, born and brought up there, have no link with Southern Sudan.

There are many who are in colleges or have established businesses in the north and would not be willing to move.

Then there are those who simply do not want to relocate because of the lack of infrastructure in the South.

However, should the South vote to secede, both Northerners in the South and Southerners in the North will be vulnerable to forced eviction, loss of citizenship, even retributive threats and violence by the two host governments.

According to Prof Abdelwahab Sinnary, the academic director of St Lawrence University in Kenya, Sudanese citizenship cannot be withdrawn unless one disowns it in favour of another.

He says the issue of citizenship is a time bomb given that politicians can easily whip up emotions, leading to the flooding of the South with people who have no connection with it.

“Unity would have been ideal in this era of regional trade blocs and globalisation. However, most Southerners mistrust the North, which in turn has not done enough to make unity attractive,” he said.

Still, the exact number of Southerners in the North is not clear given that the 2008 census figures were disputed by the South.

The figures showed the number of Southerners in the North at 520,000 people, of which 350,000 are in Khartoum.

Officially, the total population stood as 39.2 million, with 8.3 million in the South, making up 21 per cent of the national population.

But the SPLM estimates that between 1.5 and 2 million Southerners are in the North, with about 1.3 million in Khartoum alone.

Many of these remain displaced in camps, while others have settled on the fringes of society.