July 20, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – The Sudanese parliament has approved amendments to the law organizing popular consultations in the Blue Nile and South Kordofan states, extending the deadline of the controversial process by six months.

The Popular consultation is a mechanism mandated by the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) to ascertain local views in the two states on the implementation of that agreement and how governance relationship with Khartoum should be re-organized.

The process fell well behind scheduled as is the norm with many of the CPA’s mechanisms, stoking local discontent in the volatile states which witnessed severe battles during the years of Sudan’s second civil wars and whose population largely sided with the south.

In a session held on Wednesday, the Sudanese parliament dominated by the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) endorsed the draft popular consultation law referred by the cabinet which introduced amendments extending the deadline of the process for a period of six months. The approved bill also empowers the Sudanese president to extend it further at the request of the commissions administering the exercise.

MPs of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement’s (SPLM) northern sector walked out of the session in protest after their request to defer deliberations on the law until a political agreement is reached between the SPLM and the NCP was rejected.

The head of the SPLM’s parliamentary bloc Kamndan Goda announced their walkout from the session, saying they refused to be a part in approving this law in view of the fact that the parliament ignored their written request for deferral.

The walkout of the SPLM’s mps triggered an angry reaction by the parliament’s speaker and the NCP’s senior member, Ahmad Ibrahim Al-Tahir, who threatened to take measures against the SPLM’s MPs if they repeated their walkout, saying that he does not see a reason for postponing approval of the law.

Malik Agar, chairman of the SPLM’s northern sector and governor of the Blue Nile State, warned on Monday that approving the law would be a violation of the CPA and that he would not recognize it. He said that the government had bypassed the Blue Nile’s government and its elected governor when it introduced amendments to the law.

He called on the citizens to "resist the unjust and oppressive law which was passed by a single party that represents no one but itself".

The SPLM figure warned earlier this month that if the ongoing fighting in South Kordofan spilled into his state and Sudan’s war-torn western region of Darfur, it would be "coordinated," because "the enemy of your enemy is your ally."

South Kordofan has been racked by violent clashes between north Sudan army and SPLM forces since 5 June.

A political agreement signed earlier this month between the SPLM and the NCP to deescalate the situation failed to stop the fighting which erupted soon after contentious state elections saw the NCP’s candidate Ahmad Harun declared winner of the governor position over the SPLM’s leader in South Kordofan Abdul Aziz al-Hilu.

(ST)