Radio Miraya
2780: ROUNDTABLE: South Sudan's constitution crafting status and the work of the Political Parties Council
The round table. A very warm welcome to the MRA round table with me, Yaj Garang, and today we are discussing this morning, we are discussing the statuses of the constitution making process with the NCRC and political parties registration with political parties council. Seeing the reconstition, the National Constition Review Commission and political parties council have been preparing to kick start their respective processes. The commissions are composed of parties to the articulate and stakeholders guided by the principle of inclusivity, participatory, and people's driven processes. However, the commissions, like other institutions in the country, particularly peace commission, face daily challenges amid few opportunities to continue the processes of the constitution making and political parties registration among others, within the remits of their mandates. The constitution making process and political parties registration, if realized, will be the key milestones, will be key milestones for the art signal in bid to put the country to its part of nation building and democracy. For a reason, the NCRC prospects have been put to a spotlight by some political analysts, politicians, or even by the ongoing peace process in Nairobi, better known as to my initiative, while political parties has been criticized for high registration fees. Despite all these challenges, the commissions are carrying on with their mandates and here now is the platform for the commission's leadership to update the public on the status of the constitution making process and political parties registration. Joining us on the program is the chef person of the NCRC, that is Dr. Yang Yersou. Welcome to the program Honorable Dr. Yang. Thank you. Then we are also joined by Honorable Jim is a call as a client, a chef person of political parties. Council, welcome to Radio Mariah Roundtable, Honorable Chairperson. It has been a while without hosting you. Happy to have you this morning. Thank you, Dr. James, thank you so much. Then we have the Secretary General of the NCRC, who is Molana, John Natana Habram. Welcome to Radio Mariah Roundtable, Honorable SG. Thanks, Dr. Yersou. Well, as the title or the topic of our discussions tells us, we are looking at the statuses of the constitution making process with the NCRC and the political parties registration with political parties council and here we are. Given the recognition of the NCRC and the political parties council, a lot has been, a lot have been happening progressively, positively, in other words. It is worth noting that it is time now for us to take stock of all this. So let me begin with Honorable Chairperson of the NCRC, Dr. Yang, kindly bring us up to date us with the processes of the constitution making with your commission. Thank you, Dr. Yang. It is good to be here today on this talk show. As you might know, the commission since the Constitution has been carrying out a number of activities. These activities are administrative and foundational for the work that the commission has tasked to do. We have been working on a number of activities such as internal documents of the commission. We have been working on renovation of the premises so that the environment for the members of the commission is cited that it provides comfort for the members to work and we have also been doing some trainings for the members of the commission to prepare them for the activities when time comes for us to go nationwide for civic education, campaign and public consultations. We know that there will be a number of issues, a lot of them actually, and we want our members to be able to provide answers when questions come up about issues such as federalism, separation of powers, judiciary and so on and so forth. We have been trying to prepare our members so that once they go to the field, they provide the necessary answers in leadership. We have been doing all of those things and with the support of the development partners. As I mentioned some time ago that we had prepared a budget that we had submitted to the government for our activities. That budget did not go through because of a number of reasons. It was approved by the council of ministers but it never got to the parliament. What reasons? The reason that are holding back the budget from going to the parliament, I remember it was supposed to be under supplementary budget and it was passed by the council of ministers and it has gone to the parliament but soon then up to now the financial year is over and yet supplementary has not been approved. Your activities are stagnant. You cannot move forward because of resources so what are the reasons we have given? Well initially the reason was that the parliament was on recess, there was a thought that it would come back in February and then February came and never came back and then we were told that it would come back in April and then April came and then they actually convened but the budget was not tabled before the parliament as a supplementary budget and we have not been told as to why it has never been tabled before the parliament but then we know that the fiscal year has already come to an end and even if it will go to parliament it will not go to parliament as a supplementary budget and instead it will be part of this fiscal year budget but we do not know when it will get to parliament. I think the executive is still working on the budget. Okay thank you very much I will come to the SG on the same question, let me come to the chairperson of political parties council, Honorable Akal, can you bring us or talk us through all the activities that political parties council has been doing since its recognition and where we are as with registration of political parties as we stand. Thank you Dr. George, Dr. Yaj, first of all good morning and I would like also to say morning to the listeners and I would like to say Happy Independence Day to Sir Sudanese and I would like to congratulate our leadership for having brought us to where we are. First to start our focus will be basically the last 100 days. You know since the council was re-established in November and we were sworn in on the 17th of November we have done a couple of achievements and it is not as to assess ourselves, it is the public and the institutions will report to the process how we have been performing. What I wanted to bring to that attention is the purpose of which the council was established. In accordance with the provisions of Article 55, sub-Article 2-3-B, we together with Article 85-1 of the transitional constitution of the Republic of South Sudan 2011. The national legislature with the accent of the president here by enacts the provisions of the Political Parties Act. Among the provisions, Chapter 1 the preliminary provisions which states on Section 3 purpose, which states that this act provides for legal framework to regulate political parties and establish political parties counsel to register and regulate political parties and all matters incidents will hit. So this gives us the mandate to regulate all the political parties in the country. But that we have emphasized on the current situation that the country is on the exit strategy to get out of the transitional period. We all know that the election is coming and we know that by February there should be elected government in place. So as a council, we have aligned our activities to confirm with our access which is the basis of free coalition of the council and other electoral institutions. But we have divided our roles according to the electoral cycle and our electoral cycle there are activities that are supposed to be pre-election activities. So most of our activities were based on the pre-election activities which ends in June. This June, just June, yes, six months. So what we have been doing, we have been recruiting, and we have been training and we have been acquiring the tools that we need to do our job. For example, we have acquired an advanced registration system for the political parties, members, and the political parties. So this system that we have acquired, we have started training people on that system, we have run them through the induction of the system, we have run them through the induction on the regulations, we have also trained them on how to use the system. We have also conducted training on the act itself and a couple of other compliance related activities. So far, we have drawn to our members from over the entire country. Yes, there is a question I want you to come to. The law says that we should have any political party that needs to be registered, must have members in old, the members might represent all the colours of South Sudan. So we have divided in our system the ethnicity in South Sudan in the form of counties. We have 79 counties. So instead of us putting it in a tribal format, we put it in a county format where we know which tribe exists in which country. So counties are the basis of us knowing whether the political parties have captured all the colours of South Sudan or not, but not tribal. So we are not doing in our system, the system that has been developed. It is customised to capture the counties, but not tribal. So the law also talks of the states that a political party that seek to participate and register for elections must have a certain number of, a minimum number of members, registered members in a number of let's say six or seven states. Now you are talking of the counties in order to capture the colours, as you said, the colours of the diverse colours of the South Sudanese. So does it go with the law? Yes, yes, it goes because the law says that you must draw 500 from 2/3 of 10 states and 3/3 of 10 states. That means from 9 states. So we have the counties that are spread across the country. So this captures all to what the law says. Yes, a honourable share. You may recall that the question of numbers needed for registration for any aspiring political party was a contentious issue, during the discussion on deliberation on the law itself. It was enacted controversially, but later on the parties, the principal agreed as we told us on this programme sometime back. Now you have moved over to the counties. Are there any political parties that have not made this particular benchmark and were denied registration as a result? That's a very, very excellent question. The thing is, we never had a right or appropriate tools in place to be able to exercise this practice. But now with the advanced registration system, we will be able now to verify. And by the way, we have later strategies on how to make this an inclusive process whereby we will involve the registered political parties to be part of the process. So we may be the next two weeks to come, we shall call from all the registered political parties to bring their members for training on this system. There will be one male and one female. So looking at the number of political parties that are actually 29 political parties, so you multiply by two, we will be having about 58, that members that we need to train them on this system. So the system is customised in such a way that there are permissions allowed by the political parties to be able to access the system with a certain limit of restriction. So we will be working together with the political parties to make sure that whatever we do, it is done in transparent manner, and it's done in a fair and in a credible, credible way. Thank you very much, Honorable. The last question before I come to Honorable SD, how many political parties have made the deadline, 30 years of June, and are registered, how many political parties are ready now as we talked for elections in December? Previously, we had 14 political parties. That is prior to your constitution. Yes. And currently the number had served to 15 additional political parties on top of the already existing food. So we have 29. Exactly. 29. So political parties registered political parties. But likely to participate in the upcoming election. Thank you very much. I will come back to you on that. Honorable SD, as we have listened to the Chairperson, our line in the activities that you have done, seeing the reconstruction of the NCRC to date, what have been challenges that you have been meeting and opportunities that presented themselves during the period? Thank you very much. For this opportunity, I want to reiterate here that actually my Chair has precisely stated the activities that we have been carrying out. But before we get into the substance of the issues, at this historic moment it is extremely important actually to congratulate our people worldwide and abroad on the occasion of July 9th. It is important for us to remind ourselves that July 9th is all about the struggles, trials, tribulations, and ultimate victory of our people. Our people perished for socio-economic and political rise, you know. They want a life with dignity, not only for them, but for the generations event to come. And that is why we are here. And now is the time actually to cement those various gains of our people, the sacrifice of our people, into a legal document, a constitution which will be the supreme law of the land. And now the country has lots of resources. And when we have a good constitution, a people-driven constitution, it will enable the nation to run its institutions effectively, appropriately, and to the extent that actually services will be taken to the people as Dr. John was saying in a vision. And now to do that, we have a number of institutions under the revitalized peace agreement. And ours is the National Consitional Review Commission, which is a technical entity. Some of the things to achieve the goal, some of the institutions are political. So with this, we will be confining ourselves honestly to the technical aspects of the work. And this means that actually, for us, we have been trying our best to do the work. The main challenge in this country, of course, is financial, is financial. But despite all that, our sources of funding is of twofold, the government budget, as well as the partners and persons of goodwill. Now as far as the budget of the government is concerned, I think the chair has already alluded to that and stated it's very clear that now in summary, we are waiting for the budget like another institution to be table before the National Legislature. And once that happens, it will expedite our work. But even without that base on the report we have with the partners, they have been working closely with us. UNDP enemies, they have been working with us and they have been able to help us to achieve whatever we have achieved as stated by the chairperson. The internal instruments are, we have threefold strategy. One strategy is to start with putting our house in order, document wise. We have the internal instruments. That is what the action plan, autogram, action, civic education and public consultations, manual, internal rules of procedure, the budget, we have them in order now. We know where we are coming from now and where we are going to. The second thing is to ensure that actually we have a good and conducive headquarters environment. And precisely that is what also our partners are helping us in. They have effectively helped us to expand our main conference hall by extra three prefops we shall be able to accommodate our members adequately. And also they have helped us to establish the hall for the CDC, a constitutional drafting committee which is extremely important in the process. What now we are struggling with the little funding that we got from the government is to establish the offices for the leadership of the CDC. You know they will have a chair and deputy and three international experts so we need offices for them. We are also trying to have a storage facility for civic education and public consultation material or a library so that when our members are going to different states and the three items, areas that are even abroad, it will be very easy for us actually to put together the civic education and public consultation materials for them. And that will also act as a library for references, you know, on a number of issues. So those are the areas actually we're trying to use the little resources for. Thank you very much Honorable SG for elaborating on what the chair has told us. You have talk of the commission being a technical. But other analysts, political analysts and analysts in the country plus politicians showing the term, irrigated on the NCRC as a technical body. Well the NCRC as a commission is supposed to be a technical body. But it's constitutional, Honorable SG. The members are drawn from stakeholders, stakeholders that do not necessarily need to have a knowledge on the constitution making process. Well they have a direct education, a respected education, but what makes them technical when they are appointed to the NCRC? Very good question, you know, by nature, every human being is a political animal, right? But then we have in any institutional work, we have jurisdictions and like our job or mandate is cut for us under the Consumer Making Process Act and when the members were appointed and now when the secretariat is established the way we are now, we are taking the nature that it is our administrative responsibility to ensure a level ground for all the stakeholders to be able and the people of South Sudan to be able actually to engage in the constitutional making process without favor or discrimination. But the political aspect comes only in the very fact that the content of the constitution when the stakeholders are dealing with it, when they are addressing those issues, those issues are social, political, economic, all those things are there. But when you are in the leadership, as we are now members as well as a secretariat, you have to do the technical administrative work to ensure that the people of South Sudan have the trust in the process. If the people lose confidence and trust, then you are nowhere, you have to win the confidence of the people by ensuring that you bring them together and how we make our people technical is by training them, that's why the Honorable Chair just explained that we have had a number of training workshops in different constitutional issues, particularly issues of federalism so that when they go out there for civic education and public consultations, they will be able to respond effectively to the concerns coming from the people. Let me transfer this question over to the Chair, the Chair, the Honorable Dr. Yang. Your SGS just told us the Commission is met technical by the training, the training they are getting under the NCRC and of course we are having some education in their respective -- but the key question that remains is that this Commission, 55% of the members are representing political parties, hence their appointment is political, this is the fact, 55% of that according to the law, then the 45% are stakeholders, who are from people with disabilities, academia and many others in this, so if you bring the 57 members as NCRC and the fact that the NCRC is a technical body, they became technical automatically is a question that is disputed and can be -- and many questions, of course you have read on social media and there have been some papers arguing that the Commission should have been technical but instead it is political. What do you have to say on this? There's one question. The second question, you have alluded to the funding and I want to -- I reserve this question to you so that you declare it to us how much have you gotten if you have gotten because they have took off, the latest budget we have forgotten, this is to you and what are you doing with this money that you have gotten and is it part of the budget or is it part that is meant to establish you and to you as you wait for the budget you took off, one over here. Thank you. Let me begin with the last question about how much we have received and whether it is part of the budget or not. The money is given to us as an advance. Once the budget goes through it will be deducted, it is given to us for the establishment purposes so that while we are waiting the Commission runs continue moving. This is the purpose of it. It is given to us in the amount of 800,000 US dollars but it is given to us in South Sudan is pounds using the bank rate which is a very tricky thing because the rate is lower than very much half of the rate in the market so when you take that money the services that you are going to buy will come from the market and you go by that rate so technically the money is just half of that so it is like 400,000, 400,000 but we want to use it for the purpose that it was given to us establishment and earlier we mentioned to you that we have been assisted by the development partners in a number of activities including renovations and things like that but the renovation is not comprehensive because of shortage and funding so we want to use that money to cover what the development partners are unable to cover our main goal now is to make the environment conducive for us to be able to operate nationwide with the comfort that is needed so that's about the money. The first question about the Commission being technical is anyone could dispute it if one wants to but it would all depend on what that individual defines technicality it is technical because the work that is being done there is technical and those that are nominated to be the ones doing that work have the technical knowledge in that particular area so that they are nominated by the political parties does not remove that quality of being technical from them so it's just like when the article was formed it was formed from the political parties but the work that they were going to do is the work of the government of South Sudan not the work of the government of the parties. So this is what I want to say about whether or not the Commission is technical it is technical because of the nature of the work that it is assigned to do and the people have the technical and the commission was supposed to expand itself meaning as it goes into realization of its mandate it is supposed to have some mechanism that are supposed to work on it and one of them you have to be mentioned and you are preparing a space office space for them and that is CDC it was supposed to be to be recruited and then you are supposed to have an expanded the sectarian sectarian under the Commission and of course the PSC and the NCC and so forth one do you see all these other sub-mechanisms under the NCRC coming for? Thank you for the question as you just mentioned the act is made in such a way that it designs the process and it gives it stages and for each stage there are a number of mechanisms to interact together to do the task for that stage there is the Commission as the overall body body then you have the CDC you have the National Constitutional Conference you have the preparedness of comedy and then you have a constituent assembly each of those has its specific assignment given to it but facilitated by the NCRC for example during the first stage the bodies that are to be involved too it is the Commission and the CDC the Commission will carry out the activities collecting views from the people carrying out civic education compiling a report analyzing it and then once that is done the report is given to the CDC to start drafting the first constitutional draft text then that state will come to an end then we move to the other stage where the Commission the CDC the preparatory subcommittee and the NCC will be the actors at that stage and then when they finish then we move to the second stage to the third stage where the legislation will transform itself and to a constitutional assembly for the purpose of adapting the final text that comes out from the second stage and to the permanent constitution so they don't come to get they don't come but my question is you were reconstructed in November and now is like eight months into your reconstruction the CDC has not been recruited it is it is no news about it other than this office is fed that you are preparing for and and and and and and and you are supposed to collect views and all these things it is stuck so what what is happening with the CDC recruitment what is happening with you consulting so the CDC the first stage in in other words of the constitution making process the whole thing is about money all right thank you very much yeah go ahead if we had the money we would have done all of this but because we do not have anything to start with then we cannot take a step forward that is the bullets that is silver bullet thank you very much honorable chair honorable chair of the peace ppc ppc you have a inform us be earlier and I think this is a this that a 29 political parties have registered and these are political parties that are likely to to to to participate in upcoming elections and now precisely have you close registration there's one thing there's one question to have all these political parties the 20 the the additional 15 the additional 15 have they met the requirement of of of registration and and key among the requirement is a question of 75,000 US dollars for registration of political parties have these other 15 political parties that have joined other already 14 registered political parties have they met the requirement this is the the the the second question and by the way I should I should tell you thank you I mean congratulations for the new office that would integrate it on on the 8th and on the eve of the independent is a very beautiful office and this is a a a a commendable work by sassad and his and many other partners but a question with that also is it a rented premise are you likely to be thrown out like you were thrown out a say is some years back because of failing to to to meet the the the the the construction it tends or is it a property or political parties council on our chair yeah thank you dr dr judge thank you for acknowledging the effort achievement made by the council the entire team of political parties council the the management the members and and all members of the council first of all yeah the law says that for any political party aspiring to participate in the election must be registered 180 days prior to the election that means six months must be registered so those who were planning to participate in the election had hurry up and got registered the question that whether they have paid 75 thousand as the requirements said they have paid differently but they are paid within the same regulation that governs all the political parties what does that mean that means because if if you look at the wishes wishes the real problem that we have in our country here people don't read those regulations the 75 that has been put as the registration fee it is not a one time fee okay it's not a one time fee in a sense that when we are applying for a provisional registration you need to go through processes from one up to five and each and every step has its own fee okay so if you meet all the steps at the end of the day after meeting all the steps the cumulative fund figure that you are spent will amount to 50,000 wishes provision registration okay so we are not asking political parties to pay 50,000 for provisional registration affronts no there are parties that had already name and symbol search was done for them so they are not supposed to pay 20,000 there are parties that had producers of information to a company was already provided application for provision registration that means 15,000 they are not supposed to pay that there are verification of application that had done was done long time ago and and and they are not supposed to pay the 3,000 provision enrollment wishes 2000 was done already so the party that had certificate of provisional registration which is 10,000 that had expired we are given a new certificate of provisional registration so so that's it so if if you now the parties that instead of paying 50,000 they end up paying 10,000 but that 10,000 it is paid and an applicable rate wishes the rate of central bank so when they go to central bank to pay 10,000 they end up paying 5,000 because the rate of central bank is half of the blood market so many of them are becoming very excited about it and and and that is why you have seen the number had grown because people do not understand this at the beginning and and the fact that this fee it is there like that because you know when we are enrolling all the members of the political parties who will be going like for instance we want to capture the data as they have provided us these are the list of the members we will tell them okay let us go where are they they will say it is in far east we will go to far east and they provide us a list of other members wishes far west we will go to far west and and so forth we will be moving across the country capturing the the biometric the the the data of the members of the of the parties so this exercise it is really even even they themselves the parties cannot if they are given a task to do this to go and enroll this they will not be able to do it when they are asked to pay that money you see then after you fulfill the provisional registration processes now comes what comes to application for full registration which is the second stage which is the second stage and the second stage also comprises of four steps which is 25 so you when you are to register a party you are not asked to pay 25 at once no it's not at once you have to go through stages confirmation of requirement for full registration that is 8,000 payable in SSP so it will end up being 4000 per usual to information to accompany application for full registration which is 2000 when you are coming to pay according to the current rate now in central bank it will be 1000 verification of application and proof of compliance is 5,000 it will end up being 2500 they will pay the all paid in SSP in SSP all nobody had been asked to pay in this dollar couple of people have been coming to office they want to pay in dollar we have turned them down we tell them one we don't receive cash that's number one we are we are cashless system when I mean we don't receive cash in offices that's number one you must go and pay in the bank and you must pay according to the rate of today we don't want more and we don't want less we want to be compliant so you don't pay us more no pay according to the rate of the central bank at the day you are paying and that rate you must get the rate from the central bank and that is the basis for activity now comes the last one which is the certificate of full registration which amounts to 10,000 dollars when you are paying it in SSP becomes 5000 now because there are political parties that is still have challenges to meet the requirements they are using this as a pretext to to confuse other political parties who wanted to register and I'm sorry to say this because we need to see that there are values and ethics on the process of registration and we want to see that everyone is complying with the law as a stated as a stated the fee itself if you look at the rights and privileges of political party in section 8 subsection 3 a political party registered in accordance to this act shall pay in respect of the registration such fees we shall not be refundable as the council it may be made by regulations determinate so this fee is determined by the council this is the power that was given to the council by the law and and and that is the basis of which the council had worked and came up with the with that fee coming to your other question to the have they really the met the requirement yes they they had met the requirement based on what they provided but we shall go in the ground and we find that what they have provided is not correct we do register them because we shall enroll if these members don't exist if you if you have given us the list of cows or or whatever we will find out they will give us leads yeah we will verify it and and to not be we will be doing it together with those parties so it's not going to be an individual thing and that is why we as the council we are going to go to the states so that we make sure that what we do we do it together with the political parties at the grassroots level on our board share to conclude sorry to conclude you talk about the new headquarters which is the last question that is passed this new headquarters is 100% owned by political parties council wow and it's not run and don't expect us to be thrown out you will not be thrown out yeah this is the symbol and we we think that it is right to put the right infrastructure for democracy but that's that's the only way now the nation should be following we we are tired of trending not renting we are tired of people coming to part through other means other sources but I don't want to mention let us make the democracy to be the only way that we get into the seat elected people to represent people well you say why did you get the money from and how much did you buy this the premise because to my knowledge you have not been building all these things over over over the years first of all we were resourced and by the government yes by the government we were resourced and the resources that we have we had put our requirements and according to the priorities and and the needs that are an urgent need an urgent need is to to have a premises and to have a conducive working environment and and also to have office that is accessible to by law says that office must be in the in the town so it becomes easy for our staff and the political parties that we are regulating and the ones that are aspiring to be registered to make it much more efficient and accessible for them where we we got the money of course we only get money from a consolidated fund and and there's never enough money always yeah right it is how you manage the little money you get that makes it enough for you even if we are given what we will still not have there's never a body that will come and tell you know we have been given enough money the money is enough according to your needs we have reduced our needs to meet the the current existing requirements we have so many requirements but we had only organized ourself to put our needs based on the pre-election activities of which we had put the infrastructure that we had in place and the reason why we want to have a firm headquarters it is to be able to have a state offices we cannot establish state offices if we don't have a firm headquarters so so you are telling me now this is the question I by the way I wanted to ask you having a premise in any as beautiful and big as us are that I need to visit it one day and whether you have established a state a state a sub offices have you established them or you have not established them we have already recruited people for the states and this will have been undergoing the conduction pro induction programs on the system and everything and we wanted the same people that will be announced maybe in a week or ten days to come to be involved on the process okay to be involved with these are the people who will be coordinating with the state authorities and the headquarters so we did not try first to go to the states when we don't have headquarters so we want to have you know we have all our plans and strategies lie in such a way that it is sequential in a manner that that smooth and tall operation you see so we have strategies in place to make sure that things come into your last question which you may think that I didn't want to answer or how much you received you bought the building with sometimes looks it looks awkward when you ask this would look nice how much did you buy we don't want to make others we have similar you know we are we are the tarmac you know the front of our building yeah the tarmac and someone was telling me hey now you're making the tarmac in front of your body how much did it not cost you one million dollar I told them come on look we are cost effective we are cost efficient we are cost oriented the little money we have we must make sure that we spent within our budget so this thing that we are making in front of our building it is within our budget this little man that was given to you can do all these I said yes it can do all these as long as there's nothing going under the table you have not answered the question and the question is how much does it cost and how much did you get yeah because because for me to to say exactly how much the cost of the building the cost of the building has so many you know into it first of all the cost of the building has the the system on it it has the the what I was just saying now the tarmac in front of the building and and other necessary modifications that we have done in the building so we we haven't yet concluded the the entire yes the entire figure because the building was in a structural format but we had to customize to make it look in the in a way it is now it weight is it and it is beautiful yeah okay just in two minutes before I come to to to to to to the sg you have been personally you have been accused of working in lettering in in the in the council and and this is where what what is the source of my information the source of my information is the the program that I held on on this on the session of round table that I held on this program and with the political parties the political parties contesting the registration fee and the in fact said that this was a unilateral decision by the share person in person and that at the at the time you were not around you were in nairobi I could not access you this is one two in relation to this honorable share the council I mean the ministry of justice and constitutional affairs issued a legal opinion on the 75 and registration requirement put for for by your council in in conformity with the law you have just said now and you have broken it down to a manner that is convinceable and you seem not I mean the council seem not to have hinted on on on on the on the legal opinion of the ministry of justice what does that one still thank thank you so much doctor yet once again and and it's good that you've raised this question that I've been lingering in in public we we as the council appreciate it and acknowledge the role played by the media and as well as the role played by the social media and it is very very important they're all played by media at pre-election period we really determined the post-election period because if the piece I mean if the pre-election period is smooth definitely we will have a smooth post-election period and nobody does this is only the media and that is why I had to respond to your short notice and I turn up to come this morning because I see that we need to collaborate we need to work together we need to send message to people thank you for that I was accused as you said of being the person that acts unilaterally no I don't work as an individual we work as a as a team a decision that was passed yes of course on the chair of the council I speak according to the law I'm given the right to be the only one that speaks on behalf of the council but I speak the voice of four members I speak the voice of the council this is not my individual voice it is the voice of people I represent you know and on on 23rd of January on 23rd of January the regulation was table before the council the quorum was enough and there was an attendance the attendance was there signed and minutes and the resolutions were signed by me and the regulation was unanimously passed by the council members and I signed the same day and that was the day I announced the registration of the political parties so I did not come into the question of of Ministry of Justice you know Minister of Justice and political parties council we are two government institutions if there are matters that of image we have realigned or self of the Minister of Justice the opinion that was given to the advocate who wrote a petition to Ministry of Justice it was another opinion written to us it was an opinion written to to the president yeah it was in a response to the petitioner it was not addressed to the council you understand what I mean yeah understand so so it was an opinion so you don't need to act on it yeah at the moment the Ministry of Justice is the chief legal advisor, advice of the government, I cannot object to what he says and I cannot comment on him in the media if there are things we will see together with the Justice Government, I don't think we shall discuss those but I don't think I don't think we should discuss this thank you thank you thank you so much I know we are handling the two separate commissions here in on this program money and when one is speak the other one goes silent completely it is a kind of not interactive program but let me try my best honorable as given all that you have said before in an anticipation of the constitution making process that is about to start once you have resources at hand do you think that there is unfitted political and civic space enough for South Sudanese to to to to to air out their views give you information that will enable you to have the first draft of constitutional text that is people's driven, inclusive and people's wanted constitution is in other words is the environment conducive enough for you to to to to to to to to do for South Sudanese not for you because you are a government commission for South Sudanese to to to to come out and say we want a constitution that says one two three without being intimidated I'm saying so because the other analysts argue and even some politicians argue that there is there is isn't enough political and civic space in South Sudan for us to conduct the the the the the the the the constitution making I mean to to have the process of position making a hence there is a need to have this program outside South Sudan this is a briefly to you and then I will come to this year. Thank you Dr. Raj for this occasion or question now we are actually building and devoring to build as a nation we're endeavoring to build a democratic society and in democracy people and entities express their views on issues but as I stated to you right from the beginning as a technical institution we will be focusing exclusively on implementing our mandate as under the constitution making process act 2022 as per our mandate we are now actually almost we have finalized our civic education and public consultations subcommittees for the tennis test and the real administrative areas the national civic education subcommittee will be starting to sit very soon in order to work out some specifics and the final touches of our programs and once we get the reasonable resources or funding either from the partners as well as our government we will be able actually to go to the various destinations and time is speculating on civic education issues civic space issues and all that but when they actually stakeholders around the ground are doing the work if such a situation arises situation should be addressed on basis of facts and circumstances of that particular case but when we get involved in speculations it will bog the government down so that is what I can say briefly so there is there is there is no ground to argue that there will be no political and civic space string string or a fitted political and civic space as you carry along with your work yeah that thing comes along of course there is that view that part of the constitution making process is to take place abroad and all that again that is a political issue but as per the constitution making process act the process starts and ends in south Sudan here we want it to be actually a people driven process and this process under the act here is agreed upon by the various stakeholders and ultimately signed by his excellency the president in 2022 and this process is really elaborate push the people at the center instead of the process going at the days when actually the process is tough to bottom when conditions are prepared by a few and then imposing the people the people know what they want as far as the various constitutional issues are concerned and it is high time that we give them that opportunity to determine let them cook the food within the country here and then they will say yeah and save it to themselves thank you very much Honorable S.G. Honorable Chair Dr. Yang I would want to make you I will give you opportunity when we come back for a break and to all our listeners you will be able to call us on 0 9 29 6 8 6 297 or 0 9 1206 2950 stay tuned for the next session of this program your listening to Radio Miraya Seasons tune into Miraya's special coverage reports and features on agriculture environment wildlife and tourism seasons every Tuesday after the news at 1 p.m. with a repeat on Sunday at 6 p.m. seasons covering all the seasons just for you Miraya the round table informative fresh and direct what do the people of South Sudan want they want just any government or they want a government that they feel would represent the kinds of things they need that will bring a sustainable peace here from the experts policy makers and major stakeholders about trending national issues around you on the round table ideas are served join the experts as they discuss national issues and how they affect you the round table every Saturday from 8 to 10 in the morning with a repeat on Sundays from 6 to 8 p.m. or the rate you write the round table. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] will be in. Thank you so much.