On the Brink...

So I find myself, for the third time, in a country on the brink of a new era..
2003 - First peaceful elections in Cambodia since the end of the Khmer Rouge regime.

2008 - The End of the monarchy and the first constituent assembly elections in Nepal

2010 - The first multi-party (nationwide) elections in Sudan in 24 years..

And this third one is a biggie!

Not only am in Sudan- I am in Juba, the capital of Southern Sudan. Where the heart of the conflict began 25 years ago.

This place is amazing - I feel like am in an entirely different country to the North and the countries capital. In every respect; the landscape, the climate, the people, the politics.

This is Africa. At its finest: Bloody tribal fighting out in the villages, plunder and destruction of anything resembling a natural resource and a few hundred international aid agencies zooming around town in an cloud of obligatory White Toyota 4WD induced dust. (me ashamedly one of them..)

Yesterday (9th Jan) was the fifth anniversary of Peace in Sudan. Five years ago the North and the South signed a comprehensive peace agreement, ending 21 years of fighting, Africa's longest running civil war, that saw 2 million people killed. I am not sure if you'd call the last five years exactly peaceful and prosperous.. but at least Peace was finally no longer an endangered species on the brink of extinction, much like the extensive wildlife that used to roam the plains of southern Sudan.

But where is the future of this precarious land headed? Peace is about to be tested with both an upcoming election that all parties (north and south) will participate in for the first time and then the ultimate moment of truth - the referendum of 2011. Will Southern Sudan become an independent State, as so many here wish? More importantly, if they gain independence will they cease with the internal tribal fighting that threatens to tear them apart from the seams within? Quite a good overview from BBC here.

Why is it so hard for the various collections of the human race on this beautiful continent to live side by side, I often question. But then someone reminded me of the centuries of bloody fighting Europe has hosted, over race and borders, even into the nineties in eastern Europe. Of Israel and Palestine’s inability to co-exist. And the south America's and Asia... And so I end up questioning if it is simply an ill-trait of human nature to fight what we do not understand.
One of my favorite writers on Sudan, Alex de Waal, has some interesting thoughts on the situation here and here.