Riek Machar Wonders Why His Country Does Not Apply Sudanese Laws!

Juba – Sudanhorizon – Agencies

The First Vice President of the Republic of South Sudan, Dr Riek Machar, said that his country should have applied the laws of Sudan, from which it seceded in 2011, given that it contributed to drafting and enacting those laws, instead of searching to create laws from scratch, and that those laws would have been effective in South Sudan.

According to what was reported by “Radio Tamazuj” yesterday, due Sunday, Machar expressed his feelings after last week’s approval of the report of the South Sudan Judicial Reform Commission, saying that independent South Sudan “should have inherited the laws of Sudan that it participated in establishing and started to catch up with the rest of the world.”

However, the funny thing is that Machar returned and confirmed that he did not mean “adopting Islamic Sharia” in South Sudan. He added that South Sudan contributed to enacting most of Sudan’s laws; therefore, adopting them and amending some of them would have accelerated legal reforms in his country.

“Had we properly adopted the laws of Sudan that we contributed to, we would have reformed our judicial system and administration of justice without any difficulties, but we decided to start from scratch,” he said.

Machar also advised the country to reconsider “adopting the pre-independence laws of South Sudan, with the exception of Islamic law, to catch up with other countries that have reformed their judicial systems, rather than making new laws.” He stressed that “perhaps we should critically reflect on some of our decisions when we refused” to adopt the pre-independence laws of Sudan.

The first vice president, also the chairman of the opposition Sudan People’s Liberation Movement party, tasked the Joint Reconstruction Committee to discuss the laws enacted in Warrap and Lakes states, to end the vicious cycle of conflict and cattle rustling there. Warrap State introduced the Green Book law, which includes strong and deterrent penalties such as death by firing squad, for crimes such as cattle raiding, revenge killings, rape, forced marriage, kidnapping, and hate speech.

In 2022, Lakes State implemented a similar law called the “Public Order Act” to tackle crimes, noting that “Warap and Lakes States are a whole step ahead of others,” according to Radio Tamazuj.