South Sudan has right to build dam, benefit from its resources – deputy foreign minister   

JUBA – South Sudan has the right to build dams along the river Nile, and to benefit from all its resources including water, the country’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Deng Dau Deng has said.

This comes a week after a spokesman for the Sudanese ministry of water irrigation said South Sudan cannot build dam without prior approval from downstream countries like Sudan and Egypt.

“Anybody who is saying South Sudan can’t build a dam is not correct. South Sudan has its plans and priorities, depending on what the first priority is,” Dau told Sudans Post in an exclusive interview on Monday in Juba.

The senior government official said the government is not ready to build dam as of now, but will definitely inform neighbors on plans because the country won’t keep developmental plans secret as they are not meant to harm others.

“Our current priority now is to implement the 2018 peace deal, and when the time comes for other priorities like building the dam, they will be done and all our neighbors will always be notified on what we are going to do in developing our country,” he said.

The senior government official further said the Nile projects such as dam building and other developmental plans along the Nile will be done in coordination with South Sudan’s neighbors and partners.

He revealed that the plan to build dam in South Sudan is a pre-independent dream.

“It is not a new thing, even when Sudan as one, there were plans for the ministry of water and electricity to generate power which should be built in South Sudan,” he said.

“This is not a new plan and we are talking about vision and future of South Sudan as a country and it will also have national plans to build a dam,” he added.

The top government official said the River Nile is a shared commodity that can benefit all the countries of Nile-Basin.

“River Nile is shared commodity between the countries of Nile-basin and we have all the understanding and we know the effects and what water can bring to all of us,” said the deputy minister.

“South Sudan is not building a dam as we speaking but it has vision and program to work on how to generate internal power for the use of its citizens,” he added.

Recent statements by the government official on building of dam caused uproar in Egypt with some Egyptian analysts saying it was a plan sponsored by Ethiopia.