Radio Miraya
2784: Nationwide: R-JMEC Updates on Implementation of the R-ARCSS
[MUSIC PLAYING] Nationwide, we bring you latest current issues, discussions, and information. Nationwide, Andrejimiraya. Hello, and good evening to you listening to Nationwide. My name is Sanny Martin. You are coming to life from Juba. And today, we are going to be looking at the very latest update on the implementation of the River TLSP agreement over 2018. We're just over eight months to the end of the transit period or the Indian period in the country next year in February 2025, as per the River TLSP agreement on the River TLSA agreement. And the resolution of the conflict in the Republic of South Sudan, Ararsis, the reconstituted joint monitoring and evaluation commission, Arjimik, a body that was mandated to monitor the implementation of the agreement released. It's quarterly report for the period of 1st of April to 30th of June, this year on the status of the implementation of this agreement. So where are the parties when it comes to the implementation of this agreement? And what are the challenges making them not to meet some of the deadline in terms of implementing the critical task as required by them? These are some of the questions we are going to be putting to my guest here who will be telling me more about it. And I am joined here in the studio by Dr. Thompson Fontaine, who is the deputy chief of staff, strategy at Arjimik, a good evening. And welcome to Vladimir. Very good evening to you, Sari, and to your many listeners. It's great to be here with you again. OK, our lines will be open to you later on where you can call on 091206079 or 09120602950. Or you can send us your comment to our SMS number 0912177141. And those are all our lines. You can get in touch with us here during this discussion. First of all, let's talk about the entire piece process. It's implementation. Where are we right now before we look at the quarterly report? Well, I am saying, as you know, we are approaching six years since the signing of the peace agreement. Initially, when the peace agreement was signed, it was supposed to have been a free year period. So you can see that we have gone a long way without getting to the end of the road, which was supposed to have been elections at the end of a traditional period. So what that tells me and what I should tell the public is that implementation of the peace agreement has not gone according to plan. It has not gone as quickly or as effectively or as efficiently as was anticipated. And so just a couple of months shy of the six year anniversary, we still have some ways to go. Implementation right now is moving extremely slowly. There was some key aspects of the peace agreement that was supposed to have been done within the past few months. For example, the completion of the unification of forces, which by the way, was supposed to have been accomplished within the first eight months of the signing of the peace agreement. And we are still struggling with that aspect of it. And of course, the more important one of the preparation for elections, we are still struggling. So in a nutshell, we still have some ways to go. Implementation has been slow, and we've had many, many challenges that we'll talk about later, I'm sure, as we go along. Has a monitor, does it worry, argument, with this slow pace of the implementation, given the fact that time is against the parties agreement? Oh, absolutely. We are very much worried about this. This is something that we have been pointing to continuously. We have always been able to remind the parties to the agreement of the obligation of what they signed on to, and which was to implement the agreement towards the staging of elections at the end of the transitional period. So as monitors of this peace agreement, we have been pointing that out regularly, or when Gauge Mains with the Council of Ministers, if the presidency, if the parliament all has been to remind them of that obligation and the need to really move and to move more quickly on some of these aspects of the peace agreement. OK. And somebody will be asking, has you kept briefing them and writing a report? And given these challenges, the slow pace of the implementation of this agreement, what should be the main challenge to the parties? Well, the main challenge is we've identified, and we've been constantly stating those. There were three of them, really, and but two major ones. And that is what we call the lack of political will, because we believe that if there was that political will to get things done, it would have been done. But in many instances, promises have been made, and we've just not seen it happening. So political will has always been one of the issues that we've talked about. And what we mean by that is the willingness of the parties to work more closely together and to do what they have to do. So that's number one. The second one, which is equally important, is the lack of dedicated resources. We have seen that in many instances, the level of resources that we expected to go towards implementation has not been there. So for example, resources to complete the unification of forces, we have not seen it. Even now, with the election institutions being set up, the resources that they need to do your work is not there. So this lack of resources has really troubled the implementation from the very beginning. And that is something that we really would have loved to see a lot more work, a lot more emphasis on in terms of making those resources available to the parties and to the implementation process. - Okay, and has part of your quarterly report from first of April to the scientists of June, what have you come up with in your report? - Well, what the report shows is that it just looks at the last three months of implementation. And we were expecting certain things to happen during that three month period. So for instance, we were hoping that the phase one unification of the forces would have been completed during that period. That did not happen. We are also hoping that phase two would have started. And as you may recall, the unification of forces has been put into two phases, phase one, which is partially complete and a phase two where you're supposed to start and last for about three months. So that did not happen. Also other areas, other things that we looked at, for example, the National Cultural Amendment Committee. They completed their work. They've basically made 25 adjustments to 25 pieces of legislation that has gone forward. And that is a very important part of it. The Judicial Reform Commission as well completed their work during that time. The Judicial Reform Commission is that body that was set up to review the judicial system in the country and to make recommendations towards its improvement and its reform. They have completed their work, but they have not yet been able to issue their report to the government formally. And we expect that to have happened in the last period. Part of it again has to do with resources. Not being able to apportion the resources to the commission, to the committee, sorry, to actually do that. So there is a lot of these types of things where you expect certain actions to happen, and that not happening. In other areas, for example, in the transitional justice area, there was an expectation that the bills before Parliament would have been passed. It has not yet been passed, but at least the process has started. It did not happen in the last quarter. So we hope full that this quarter will see the passage of the two critical bills for repatriation and for truth, reconciliation, and healing. The hope is that those two bills will, in fact, pass through Parliament this time quarter. And at the moment now, what is being implemented has to speak by the parties as a monitor. As we speak, what has happened this past few weeks is that the too many process is kind of slowed things down, even further. Is it overshadowing 2018 that what LSP has been implemented to my NEPIS process? I would not necessarily say overshadowing, but because it has happened, all the focus has been on that process, and we have not seen. So, for example, we've seen very little movement in terms of, again, the unification of forces, preparation towards election. There isn't much of that going on. So, you know, and then also the party dialogue that was supposed to have been started last quarter, where the parties were supposed to have sat down and agreed on the best way forward. That has not really happened. And that's a very important point to note, because the expectation was that the party study agreement having come to just about five months before the proposed election period, there was a hope that the parties would have been able to sit down and to review the deadlines, the timelines, rather, towards elections and see what is the best way forward. And also provide some clarity to the public as far as elections are concerned. Because you will admit that there is a lot of conflicting information out there, a lot of conflicting statements. We have had a date of announcement, a date announced of elections on December 23 by the body responsible and in charge of elections, the National Electoral Commission, announcing the date of December 22. And yet, we have other people saying, well, no, it cannot happen. It should, you know, there are different things to be done. So, there is some uncertainty around that. And it would have helped the process quite a bit. If the parties, again, that is something that our chair requested the parties to do, to really sit down and provide that clarity to the public of South Sudan in terms of what's next and what they can expect going forward. Yes, in your last academic plenary meeting at Beijing Hotel, your chairman said that he's asking the parties to make a more clarity on whether there will be election or not. And he was hoping that after the Inter-party dialogue that concluded last week or two weeks ago would have made more clarity on whether we will have election in December, this year or not. Like you also said, there are so many voices which are not in uniformity of whether to have election or not. Does it work? Ergemic at this point of time with just five months? Well, absolutely it does because, you know, to be so close to what we consider to be the date for elections, to be that close and not having that level of clarity is definitely a problem. And so that is very concerning to us as monitors that we've not been able to get to that point where it is very clear. So one example of this is that if you're going to have elections in December, the fact of the matter is the National Electoral Commission has not yet started the process of registration, okay? They've not yet started the process of registration. So that is one concern that we have, okay? If you're going to have elections, you most have a register, right? That's a very basic part of it, you know? And we have seen a little bit of progress, for example, the NSE set up, the offices at the state level. That is good, but the question is, are those offices been empowered? Are those offices being provided with the resources that they require? So that lack of clarity is really a problem because the, and the reason why I say it's a problem is that in the absence of clarity, you have different people speculating, you have different ideas coming out, and then that uncertainty itself is not good for the peace process, right? - Yes, yes, yes. - As our Islamic members, have we taken it upon yourself to meet with the senior leaders from all parties seeking for more clarity? What did they say? - Yes, we have. - Have you got the answers? - Yes, we know. In fact, they are great. They all, all of the parties, because we do that on a very regular basis, we meet with the senior leadership of the various parties to the agreement, and they all agree that they need to dialogue. They all agree that they need to sit down, you know, very much in a similar fashion in which we had the roadmap. You recall about two years ago, in 2022, the roadmap came as a result of the parties sitting down and deciding that given the time left and the task that had to be done, they needed additional time. - Two years. - They need these extra two years. The problem though is that the two years have basically come and gone, and not much was done during that time. Again, going back to the piece of implementation, going back to political will, going back to lack of resources. So, you know, it's almost like, and to some people it's extremely frustrating, because it's almost like a recurring thing. Over and over again, you know, we have the same problem. Elections are coming up, no preparation has been done, no nothing tangible is happening, and then we have to go through that process again. So, the hope was that the parties would have really, you know, taken that on as a matter of urgency and sat down and decided clearly what they want to do and informed the South Asian public as to the next steps. - And also, in your quarterly report when I was reading through this afternoon, I also came across somewhere where you are also raising some concerns about the key task deemed necessary to allow the conduct of free, fair, and credible elections have not been implemented so far, with just five months as announced by Nick, the National Election Commission that 22nd, December, this year will be the D-Day for South Sudan to first conduct its election after gaining independence. So, do you think as an algorithmic, those critical tasks that's really required to have a free, credible election can be achieved within this remaining five months? - It appears almost impossible. And the reason why I say that one of the major tasks, one of the prerequisites was the constitution making, right? That was a moment that we had hoped would be seized to have a permanent constitution, by that, I mean a constitution where all of the parties were able to weigh in the people of South Sudan would have this say, and you have a constitution upon which the future of this country would be built. That has not yet happened. And you would again recall that in, when the roadmap was established, it was established around the idea that you would need at least 15 months to get that process done. That's how important it was. In other words, the length of the roadmap, the extension, the two extension that was sought by the parties two years ago was based largely on the length of time it would take for the constitution - Because there was a matrix already. And the parties knew what would be done on one wire and at what time? - Right, exactly, exactly. But there was no follow through, it did not happen. So we had a follow-up. - Well, the implementation, the agreement is very clear. Implementation for the peace agreement is squarely upon the Arctic, the government of national unity is responsible for implementation of the agreement. They are the ones who hold the resources. They are the ones who have demanded according to the agreement to implement. So any failure of implementation must be placed squarely on them, on the, on the Arctic, you know. And so, and within the Arctic, you know, all the parties operate. The five main parties to the peace agreement operate. So, you know, you have to in a way say that enough was not done on the part of the Arctic, you know, and some of them have talked about the resources, the political-- - Even the setting up of the major institutions, like the National Electoral Commission, the National Constitutional Review Commission. But these critical institutions, it took a long time for those to be set up. And even when they were set up, it took an even longer time for them to be resourced. And even when they were resourced, they were given limited resources. So, you see how the whole process has been, has been slow. And that is very frustrating. It has frustrated the entire process so that the commissions cannot work as quickly as they, as they would like to, they cannot function as much as they would like to. And so, what we really require is greater urgency on the part of the, of the Arctic, on the part of the parties to really implement the agreement as they signed on to. And that is very important, because as you said, coming up towards elections in December, we doubt having prepared the groundwork is going to be extremely problematic. - And in your quarterly report, apart from what you have already told us about the completion of phase one has not happened. The JRC have not also taken place. These two bills from the city average is still in the parliament and so many challenges. What other issues did you come up with during your quarterly report? - Yes, so we looked at the, what we do in the quarterly report is that we take a very careful look at each of those of the chapters within the agreement, because the, because the agreement has different aspects. It's not just the political and elections, but there are different aspects. So one of those aspects, for example, is the humanitarian situation in the country that we've looked at in this. And what the report observes is that the situation is actually worsening. And it has been made worse by the fact that the Sudan conflict has really pushed many, many more refugees to return, probably quicker than they would have liked to in South Sudan. So since the signing of the agreement, we've had 1.4 million refugees return in South Sudan in the past year alone, in the past several months since the Sudan conflict broke out. We've had over half a million that have come in, as much as 700, 700,000 refugees that have come back. - Close to a million. - Yes, and that has really put some pressure on the existing systems within South Sudan to be able to cope, to be able to deal with these. So we have the other situation. And of course, it is made worse by the rainy season that has compounded the whole situation. And not only that, the forecast is for more rain, the forecast is for more flooding, and it can only make the situation worse. So as far as the humanitarian situation is concerned, that is a big problem. Now linked to that is the establishment of the Special Reconstruction Fund. That was supposed to have been a fund set up by the unity government to take care of the returnings, to be able to allow them to, as the agreement says, to settle in dignity. And the idea was that the government would have provided a hundred million US dollars into this fund, and then there would be a donor conference set up to get additional resources to help the refugees. None of that has happened. The SRF has not been set up. The Ministry of humanitarian affairs, they're working to do, it's setting up, but that is taking time, it has not yet happened. So we have a situation where you have all of those refugees coming back into South Sudan in a rush because of what's going on in Sudan, and the systems are not set up adequately to help them. And that is putting a severe strain on the resources of the countries, putting a severe strain on the partners who are providing assistance in that area. And that is one of the issues that we flagged very much in the report as something that needs to be done, because it was anticipated that the refugees would have been supported for a dignified return, and the relocation services would have been provided for them, and none of that is in place, unfortunately. - Okay, and in Kafka 2, is the ceasefire holding largely? - Yes, Chapter 2 indicated that the ceasefire has been the case since the signing has broadly held, but we've seen some violations recently and that we talked about, there have been some tensions in unviolence in unity state. We had the killing of civilians in central equatoria. We also have the issue of the constant mass involvement there in central equatoria that has disrupted. There are also, I'm sure you've seen accounts more recently of recruitment that has been taking place contrary to the peace agreement. So these are violation reports that have been issued by Citizen, and they're being investigated. What happens is when we receive those violation reports from Citizen as our GMEC, we immediately pass this on to the Joint Defense Board, and for action on their part. And we point out what has been confirmed, what has been determined by Citizen. Citizen is the body that is doing the physical vetting and checking on the ground. So they verify those violations in form our GMEC. Our GMEC then informs the Joint Defense Board to take action either against those who are violated or in different ways to see how that can be done. So while we have generally been happy with the overall holding of the peace agreement, there's a number of incidents that have been taken place. And to make it worse, we continue to have the issue of inter-communal violence that has been a constant issue. Although it's not necessarily addressed in the peace agreement, but it does impact. And it does give the idea that peace is not everywhere because of this inter-communal violence in areas like people and different parts of the country. So what we are saying is that we made good progress there, but there is still a lot that needs to be done as far as COVID situation is concerned. - Yes, as you speak now, one of the major concerns without going into survey doesn't need science to prove what I'm going to say. One of the major concerns from the citizens at the moment now is will there be election in December, yes or no? It's actually one of the big issue right now, the most talks in almost all the villages because people have been hearing that there will be election in December and people will be voting. But they've not seen any sign of election taking place. So here's the monitor. Do you think it is the right time now for the parties or for article to come up clearly and has a matter of agency and make it clear to the public that look because of one to three who will have election? Or because of one to three, we are unable to conduct election as a process? - Yes, yes, absolutely. In fact, that is one of the major recommendations coming out of our quarterly assessment is the need for the parties to do just that. Just as you said, tell the public exactly what is going to happen in December. Are we going to go for elections or are we not going to go for elections? - Yes, I guess that has added a bit to them. - Yes, we have, we have. - And why are they not coming forward to do that? - We've been very clear, well, they have to sit down. They need to sit down and discuss it. - They already sat and according to what we had and what we reported, they are supposed to handle what they are report to the presidency. And see, it's only the presidency who can announce that. They did their recommendation, they did their homework, classified, what has been agreed and handed over to the presidency. - Right, so, but that has-- - Have we got a copy? - But that has not been done. It is the, as you said, it is the role of the presidency to announce it because the presidency-- - But have we got a copy? - As an argument, have we got a copy of this in the party dialogue because the party dialogue came to a conclusion almost two weeks ago? - Well, it is still on the discussion. The fact of the matter is the presidency has not yet pronounced itself in it. You see, this is something-- - Have we got a copy of the report? - Well, we don't need to have a copy of the report until it is agreed, until it has to be agreed upon. All right, because of course, we see different texts and drafts, it can still change when it gets to the presidency, okay. So, the important thing is that what they as monitors what we do is when the final text is agreed upon, that is what we then hold the parties to. We don't hold the parties necessarily to these different phases of interaction because that could change, okay. Some suggestions could be made today when it goes to the presidency, it is changed around, all right. So, at the end of the day, what we are waiting for is the final, we feel like the final decision that comes out and that is what we then hold the parties to. - All right, you all, I don't know briefly before our lines are open to our listeners to call in about this quarterly report and the entire implementation of the RRCs of 2018. You talked about the two minor piece initiative being conducted in Nairobi. And now we have the government delegation, five of them who are here in town meeting. According to the national broadcast, the SSBC, we watched last night at 8 p.m. news bulletin that they met, the first vice president, they will be meeting several people to try to explain to me because there has been this myth about two minor replacing these. We have also seen letters coming from the SBLMIO voicing the concern about the two minor. And you are observing, or you are sitting in Nairobi has an observatory to minor piece process. What is your take about this confusion moving around? - All right, well, you refer to it as confusion. What it is, is that the, to me, an eight-piece process was when it started, the idea was to get the whole groups into the peace agreement. We are talking about the likes of Pagana Mom, Paul Malang and others who are outside of the agreement. And it has felt that in a spirit of inclusivity to include everybody, where everybody should be included and to start a new, if you like to establish that new phase for future peace and security in South Sudan, it was important to have them all. And gain mind, these were discussions that were started in Rome since 2020. These discussions have been going on. - By centigridio. - By centigridio. So we've had basically four years of interaction and so on. So the whole question, when the president of South Sudan as the president of Kenya to intervene, it was with the hope that this process would be sped up and they would be able to be included into the process. Now, it took a different, it took a life of its own where a number of different things will suggest it. You would have seen the documents, what they call the initial documents that talked about having a leadership council and different things like that, that were not necessarily anticipated before it started. So what the first vice president, Dr. React Moshe said, was, well, that's not what we signed up for. The whole idea was to incorporate these parties, but not to go beyond what seems to be even a new agreement between those who are there, between the government and the whole group. So that is what is happening now. And because of that, I decided to pull out of those discussions, what is going on now is an attempt to get IO back into those discussions. And the question is whether or not that will be successful. And people are asking, well, what exactly is going on? As you said, some people are saying that it is something to rival the peace agreement. But you would have seen more recently that the parties, those involved are saying, no, it is anchored in the agreement that the agreement is the supreme document and that is the way it should be. Should be an annex. What is the role of argument in this to mind? You have members sitting there. What's the role there? Well, our role is simply as observers. We are not as, you know, we cannot interject. We cannot put ourselves into the agreement. We are, because we are supposed to be in partial monitors. We are supposed to evaluate. We are supposed to monitor. We are supposed to provide oversight. So we cannot be at the same time being involved in writing. What is going on? Writing those protocols have been a part of it. So our role is solely as observers to see what is going on and to ensure that the integrity as well of the agreement is preserved. That is also very important. Things like if parties are basically, you know, moving outside of that, then it will remind it, well, you know, that's what the agreement says. That is what needs to be maintained. But we are not actively involved in writing or being a part of what's going on, into reality. If you have just joined us right now, you're listening to Nationwide. My name is Sani Martin and in the studio, I have Dr. Thomson Fontaine, who is a deputy chief of staff, strategy at the Recostituted Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission, our generic and we are discussing their quarterly report about the status of the implementation of the 2018 Peace Agreement, which is always known as the recapitalized agreement on the resolution of the conflict in the Republic of South Sudan or ISIS. And there is a report from the 1st of April to the 30th of June, where they have looked at chapter by chapter what has been implemented so far and what is not. And if I go to any question, you can call on 0912069 or 091206950, or send us your question to our SMS number 0912177141. Those are all our comments, they are our numbers, you can send your comments to and I will be reading some of them. Hello. - Hello Sani Martin. - Yes, good evening. - Yeah, good evening. - Your name and where are you calling from? - Yeah, you can introduce you from Medina Aulop, (mumbles) - Okay, do you go ahead from our way down? - Yeah, thank you for the time that you have written. Yeah, I would like to appreciate the topics and also appreciate the presence of our guys in this video. Yeah, fans of all, I appreciate the work that they have been doing since 2018 of the agreement was signed and brought to Cuba and we celebrate for it. They have been doing their best in order to see the implementation of agreement is done by chapter by chapter. Yeah, submitting the report has given us the message today. I don't see, I don't have any point of saying that this chapter is not implemented and this chapter was implemented. How many chapters were implemented in the agreement and how many chapters were not implemented? And if the more chapters are implemented in the agreement, why are we not seeing the process of election have been started because now we live with a few months, election hard is was restricted by the agreement. - Yeah. - But now we are not seeing the process, how happy is that? - Well, what is going on? Actually, I need him to be clear on it so that the public who are listening on the radio on today can be aware of what is going on for the election. - All right. - Thank you so much. I do from a wheel. Hello. - Oh, for the election. All right. - Hello. - Thank you so much. I do from a wheel. - This release and volume of radio. - Hello. - Hello. - Yes. - Good evening. - Good evening to your name? - Yes. - Yes. - You are talking to your brother guys from USD. - Okay, from United States. - Absolutely. - Okay, go ahead, guys. (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) - No. - No. - No, the label grown. (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) So what I can ask, I have a question, all of my question to the guests. (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) - All right. (speaking in foreign language) - All right. Thank you so much for your point. You want to know in terms of percentage, how will you rate the implementation of the agreement if you have to give 100% to the agreement? You can pick one more and give you the chance to answer. Hello? - Yes, hello? - Yes, good evening. (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) - Okay, Samsung from Dubai here, go ahead Samsung. - Yeah, I welcome the guests, the studio. - Mm-hmm. (speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) We didn't see anything in our country. So the government is there making transition. There was a transition of stigma, a transition of 100 days and a transition of things. Four months, we're going for it in December, 2020, 2020, four. And the government killed in parliament what they put on table as a task. What are they doing as a monitor? To make sure that government is in parliament only task that they were put on table. That is my question. - Thank you so much, Samsung from a high referendum here. And we have another question coming from Deng in Cuba, Tomping, and he says, Dr. Tompson, thank you so much for your explanation. We have got your point, but I will not blame Arjemek for the failure of the parties to implement their own agreement because they said that the roadmap was drafted and owned by the people of South Sudan. Now they have failed to implement their own agreement. I have no problem with the Arjemek, but I would like to find out, where are the grantors in this case? Where are they? In this case, to push the parties, because you report them, where are they? Where are they so silent? And who hold the file of South Sudan now in the region? Is it Uganda, Sudan, Djibouti? - Yes, go ahead. - All right, thanks. Thank you, these are very, these are excellent questions. So let me deal with the issue, the questions of implementation that came out from both Arjemek and Unity State, as well as here in Cuba. Now, the question was, how many chapters have been implemented? - How far? - The way the agreement is structured is that within each chapter, there are several tasks or activities that are supposed to be implemented. So within, for example, chapter one, there are several things we've probably done in chapter one, out of the many articles in chapter one, we have probably done probably 80%, okay? But what remains to be done is still very important. The elections is in chapter one, it has not been done. So sometimes it's very difficult to look at percentages. - For the entire process? - Right, what is more important is to look at critical tasks within each of those chapters that needs to be done, because some of these tasks within the agreement, it has been agreed, they can be done when after elections, when it comes up, for example, a lot of what is in chapter four is more long-term, that can be done after the government has been set up, all right? So what we try to do is to focus on some of the key areas that needs to be done so that you can get to the elections, and then once elections is done, other things can be done. So we don't keep a tally of percentages, because it does not make sense in terms of how you interpret those percentages, all right? And that's the reason why I will not be able to give a percent, but just to say that some of the key tasks. So within chapter one, the election processes, for example, we are talking about the setting up of the voters ID, the whole question of polling and security and tallying arrangements. In chapter two, the security apparatus, the security services to protect and to make sure that security is provided during elections that has to be done. And that's why we talk about the unification of forces as an important first step in the process. - Because you need the safety of the voter and the safety of the materials, the bottom paper, the bottom boxes. - Right, exactly. And that has to be done for the unified forces and they are not at any place. So that's why I say you can just say, well, X percent is implemented. The important thing is that some key aspects of the chapters are not yet implemented, all right? So that is one, on the question of the guarantors, what happened was when the Sudan crisis started, you may recall that the president of Sudan, Al-Bohan was the chairperson of E-God. - By then? - At that time, in April of last year, by April of last year, he was the chairperson. And because of the relationship of Sudan and so Sudan, it was relatively, I would use it but relatively easy for us as an algebraic, when there were issues coming out of the agreement, we could appeal directly to Bohan and we saw on several occasions where himself came, all hemity would come to Juba to speak directly to the president, to the vice president, to the party, to the agreement, to get things moving. Now we lost that with the conflict in Sudan. The chairmanship then moved to Digibouti. So Digibouti has the chairmanship of E-God but they don't have the conditions or doesn't have the same relationship with the South Sudan. We saw Sudan, then Sudan had with South Sudan. So it becomes a bit more complicated in that sense. And that's the reason why we've seen the attempts now, even for some movement within E-God in terms of what's going on with the to me and the process in Nairobi. So to answer the question is, the chairperson of E-God, is the one responsible? But I just want the call us to appreciate the dynamic in a sense, the dynamic has changed. And... - But Arjamaq, I've been doing the reporting. - Yes, we report that report that we present, it goes firstly to the Artigano. So it goes to the Council of Ministers and to the presidency. That's number one. It also goes through the T&LA. In fact, our chair will sit with the T&LA and go through the entire report with them. It also goes through the Africa Union Peace and Security Council. It goes through the United Nations Security Council and to the Security General of the United Nations. And of course, through the guarantees of the Indian. - But the concern is that South Sudan should like to see action being taken because the more this process is taking place, the more people suffer. If you move away from Dubai here, you will see how really people suffer in this country. - Yes, I'm telling you, I just came back from Ben-Tiu. - Yeah. - A few days ago. So I understand, I say, we understand the difficulty that South Sudan is going through, the tremendous pressures under which they have to live every day. And that is why implementation of the agreement becomes so critical. Because that offers the best hope for last in peace. It offers the best hope for setting the basis for growth and stability in South Sudan. So that is why we keep saying that the agreement has to be implemented. But at the end of the day, the implementation rests solely on the backs of the Arctic. While it is true that there's a role for the guarantors, there is a role for outside influences. At the end of the day, the ultimate responsibility for implementation rests upon the government of national unity. And they're the ones that should be held responsible for implementation. - Finally, briefly, someone was asking, what kind of support or advice can our dynamic provide to the parties to ensure that they do what they're supposed to do? - You know, it's almost to us, we've been very clear as to what was required, or what is required. And these are things that we have been saying repeatedly. If you go through our reports, we make every report we do. We make recommendations, specific recommendations to the parties. We make recommendations to the government. We make recommendations to the guarantors. And this is the 24th, I believe. This is the 24th quarterly report. 'Cause every three months we are doing one. So, and that has always been filled with recommendations for the parties, recommendations for them to do. And so at the end of the day, I can say that we are doing what we are supposed to do. But of course, you will understand that this is a political process. It takes, sometimes it takes negotiation. It takes other persons agreeing to compromise. And different things that has to be done by different players to make it work. It does not always work. And we will continue to push for it to work. And with that, I must say that the parliament has been a lot more proactive in terms of pushing through the legislations that have come before them. And we've seen a lot more effort in that regard. And we're very happy for that. But there's a lot that has to be done still. And in particular, on the security situation, in particular, on the measures, and different things that need to be done for the elections, these has to be focused on. - Dr. Thompson-Fontaine, thank you so much for coming to our studio. We will have ample time to discuss more about, because like I said, one of the biggest concern for many sides of the nation right now is shall we, as a country, have a election? Yes or no? The answer lies in the hands of the parties or are we going to thank you so much for coming by? - Thank you, it's been my pleasure. - And that's it for you this evening. The news will be coming next at the top of the hour. Join my colleague David Lukan for the second hour of a nationwide. My name is Sandy Martin.