Egyptian analyst mocks S. Sudan over plans to build dam, calls project ‘external’ conspiracy against Egypt

JUBA/CAIRO – A Cairo-based Egyptian political analyst is claiming that plans by South Sudan government to build dams are foreign agendas meant to cause incitement and provocation against Egypt saying the world’s youngest country has not yet reached the statehood to talk of building dams.

“This is nothing but incitement and external planning,” Hani Raslan, Director of the al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies wrote on Facebook following statements by the deputy ministry of foreign affairs of South Sudan Deng Dau that his country is planning to build dams.

Mr. Raslan  went on to claim that South Sudan does not have technical and political cadres that can help in the rehabilitation of the country and said the country has not reached statehood, pointing to fighting among its political leaders that sometimes takes ethnic undertones.

“South Sudan has not reached – in its structures and political reality – statehood,” he said.

“It does not have reliable cadres in any field, and a lot of projects meant to help them are disrupted due to the lack of parties or specialists with whom it can be achieved. Until recently, the parties were fighting, and sometimes this amounted to burning their opponents alive, while they were dancing and screaming around them,” he added.

The damning statements against South Sudan by the Egyptian political analyst comes days after South Sudan’s deputy minister of foreign affairs Deng Dau said in an interview with the UAE’s The National newspaper that his country plans to build dams for electricity.