Western countries urge RJMEC to urgently plan next meeting
The Embassies of France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States, as well as the Delegation of the European Union are calling for a rescheduling of Reconstituted Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission’s (RJMEC) next meeting which was abruptly postponed. The meeting was initially planned for Thursday April 10th. 2025 but it was postponed.
RJMEC is the body mandated by the Intergovernmental Authority on Development or IGAD to monitor the implementation of the South Sudan’s 2018 peace deal.
The members of RJMEC are representatives of all parties to the 2018 peace agreement, guarantors of the peace deal, China, the US, UK, EU, among other countries, other representatives at RJMEC include; youth, women, civil society groups among others.
RJMEC’s challenge is now the disagreement among the largest opposition group known as the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army In Opposition (SPLM/A-IO)
The leader of the SPLM/A-IO, Dr. Riek Machar who is also the country’s first vice president was put under house arrest. Members of his party are now disagreeing among themselves on how to move forward.
There are some led by Mr. Machar’s deputy Oyet Nathanial (Deputy Speaker of parliament) who wants the implementation of the peace deal to come to a halt until their leader is released however, there is a group led by Stephen Par, the minister for peace building who says the implementation of the peace deal should move forward.
The group led by Mr. Par has set up a new body to push implementation of the peace deal forward, a group led by Mr. Oyet has said it has suspended Mr. Par and his group including from being members of RJMEC.
RJMEC now finds itself in a situation whereby it does not know who to deal with when it comes to inviting members for its plenary meetings.
