06/12/2024
Abyeida de Ngok ❤️❤️❤️
Padang Ayuel Jiel.
Anatomy of a Conflict
(If u can't read it all with understanding please reserve your comment, it's not needed)
Abyei has since 1905 politically and administratively straddled the North and South of Sudan. Physical control of the area offers very little tactical advantages to either side in fact its historical and political significance far outweigh the region’s economic or strategic value. Abyei’s only permanent residents and primary inhabitants are the Ngok section of South Sudan’s largest ethnic group, the Dinka. The region also plays host to Arabic speaking nomads from the Humr section of the Misseriya of Kordofan. The latter herd their cattle into Abyei en route to pastures and water sources some 75 km south of the disputed territory during the December to April dry season. The timing, route and other technical issues related to this migration were in the past regulated by the chiefs of the nine Ngok clans and the Nazirs or paramount rulers of the two sections of the Misseriya, the Humr and the Zuruk. Relations between the Ngok and Humr have varied over time, with the Ngok suffering from Humr slave raids and Humr cattle subjected to rustling by the nine Ngok clans.
In 1905 the British began cementing the process of creating a cordon sanitaire between the north and the south. The process was designed to insulate the latter from the “culturally corrupting” influence of Arab culture and Islamic faith, illustrating British colonial fixation with discrete cultural groups and containing the spread of Islam, particularly in Western Bahr Al Ghazal. Thus, in 1905 British colonial administrators transferred the Abyei region to Northern Sudan’s then Kordofan province. At the time it was argued that this arrangement was administratively more convenient than controlling the area from the southern province of Bahr el Ghazal, as it was cut off from the provincial capital for long periods during the rainy season. The rationale was also to place the Humr and Ngok under the same provincial authority and jurisdiction to deal with cattle and slave raiding.3 The transfer took place without consulting the predominantly Dinka Ngok population of Abyei. The actual size of the territory transferred is at the root of today’s crisis, as British colonial dispatches refer to Abeyi, or the area of the nine Ngok chiefdoms, but never specified its actual boundaries.
Several border shifts and territorial transfers similar to the one involving Abyei took place between the north and south and sowed the seeds of many border disputes currently hindering cordial relations between the two Sudans. This process of boundary changes reached a climax in 1922 when colonial officials forcibly evicted the entire population of the Kafia Kinga enclave in an attempt to create a “a tangible division between ‘Arab’ and ‘African’ groups along the border zone between Darfur and Bahr Al Ghazal”.4 The region, which had previously been a melting pot of cultures, became an impenetrable barrier. In 1958 the military regime of General Ibrahim Abboud annexed the Kafia Kingi enclave to Darfur.
A similar transfer occurred in 1924 when the Munroe-Wheatley agreement changed the border between the Rizegat of Darfur and the Malwal Dinka of Bahr al Ghazal. The border between the two communities and the provinces they inhabited previous lay at the banks of the river Kiir known in the north as the Bahr al Arab. However, the agreement shifted the boundary 14 miles, or 22 km south, of the river. The agreement was designed to allow the Rizegat, who the British were attempting to woo as allies, greater access to the rich grazing lands just south of the river and reduce conflict between them and the Malwal Dinka who inhabited the area. This border shift was implemented without the authorization of the Governor General in Khartoum and without consulting the Dinka at the time. As a result the agreement is currently contested by the GoSS, while Khartoum argues that since it took place before 1956 the border is not subject to alteration.
When seen in this light, the transfer of Abyei was one of several boundary adjustments by British colonial officials which have left a lasting impact on relations between the two Sudans. While much of the media and policy focus has been on the relations between the Ngok and Humr, the problem and solutions to the current conundrum lie at a higher level, namely Juba and Khartoum.
(And some folks be like Abyei matter should not be discussed in the governors forums)
Source. Accord.org.za