Elections not possible in 2023, says UN envoy

JUBA – The UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS),  Nicholas Haysom, has said that necessary conditions are not yet in place to enable South Sudan to hold free, fair, and peaceful elections in 2023.

The South African lawyer made the remarks during a press conference held in Juba on Thursday and said elections would not be possible when key provisions of the revitalized peace agreement are not fully implemented.

“As we get closer to December with anticipated date for elections following the peace agreement, it will become more apparent that the country would not meet the dateline for elections,” Haysom said.

Haysom warned that premature South elections could spur violence in South Sudan.

“In a space where conditions are not appropriate, would likely lead to violence before, during, and after elections,” Haysom said.

“In other words, electoral management body does not exist and laws have not been enacted and the structures necessary to conduct elections under the difficult situation in South Sudan,” he added.

According to the timetable agreed in the September 2018 deal, South Sudan is supposed to go to polls in 2023 after the implementation of key provisions of the 2018 agreement that ended a five-year-old political violence.

Those provisions include the unification of formerly warring forces, repatriation of refugees and displaced people, a population census, and the drafting of a permanent constitution of the East African country.

Another of these provisions is for a revision of the 2012 Political Parties Act which would be followed by its approval in parliament to enable the free and democratic registration of political parties.

“If you have to say to me is that country ready for elections right now, I would say not because the technical conditions have not been put in place,” he said.

The UN chief urged the government to create and maintain a safe and enabling environment that is conducive for the political parties to exercise their rights.

“I also pointed to the needs for the political conditions to also address and here we would draw attention to the need for open political space within which the parties can contest to each other viewpoints,” he said.

He urged the political to inject fresh momentum into the implementation of the 2018 peace deal.

“The parties have it within their powers to great those conditions, it would certainly need an energetic approach to meeting those conditions at political levels and to create a political environment in which parties competition is possible,” he said.