{"id":4017,"date":"2022-03-03T05:16:31","date_gmt":"2022-03-03T05:16:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/onecitizendaily.com\/?p=4017"},"modified":"2022-03-03T05:16:33","modified_gmt":"2022-03-03T05:16:33","slug":"minister-alors-inactiveness-delays-s-sudan-eac-integration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/2022\/03\/03\/minister-alors-inactiveness-delays-s-sudan-eac-integration\/","title":{"rendered":"Minister Alor\u2019s inactiveness delays S. Sudan EAC integration"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
Minister of East African Affairs Deng Alor Kuol \/Courtesy Photo<\/em><\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Philip Buda Ladu<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) has blamed the South Sudan\u2019s Minister of East African Affairs, Deng Alor Kuol for delaying the full integration of South Sudan into the six-member EAC economic bloc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Minister Alor has been accused of nearly two years\u2019 absentia from attending the House business sittings since his appointment by President Salva Kiir as South Sudan Minister of EAC Affairs in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The EALA members said Alor has never participated even once be it physically or virtually.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Tuesday, EALA resolved to adjourn a debate on a report on the progress made in integrating South Sudan into the six-member bloc\u2019s Customs Union.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The decision was reached by the EALA lawmakers in order to send a strong message to Juba that its Minister in charge of EAC Affairs failed to appear in the House for nearly two years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lawmakers decided that they adjourned the debate on the report till Wednesday with the hope that Deng Alor Kuol, South Sudan\u2019s Minister in charge of EAC Affairs shows up, either physically or virtually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Abdullah Hasnuu Makame, a Tanzanian MP was quoted by The New Times Rwanda\u2019s leading daily as saying, the Minister had \u201cconsistently\u201d not appeared despite the fact that \u201cwe\u2019ve been flexible; amended our rules and we have virtual procedures whereby a member who cannot be here physically can attend virtually\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Sudan was admitted into the EAC bloc in October 2016, becoming the sixth partner state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cThe business here is to discuss how we can integrate our newest member in the Community and I think the front-line person in that discussion should be the Minister from that country\u201d said EALA\u2019s Speaker Martin Ngoga.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo, what is the message he is sending to this House? Should we start with the process of integrating the Minister before we integrate the Republic of South Sudan? It is a very unfortunate situation. If it was a one-off incident, it wouldn\u2019t be an issue but this is someone we\u2019ve never seen,\u201d Speaker Ngoga reiterated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kuol was appointed to the post in June 2020 then became ex-officio of the regional Parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Article 48 of the EAC Treaty requires Ministers in charge of EAC Affairs to attend and follow proceedings in the House and due to the Covid-19 pandemic, amendments were made to House rules to permit members who cannot attend physically to at least attend online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Technically, though South Sudan has nine lawmakers in the Assembly, if a question is raised on the floor about matters pertaining to the country, none of its MPs can competently or legally answer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ngoga stressed that the absence of the South Sudan EAC Affairs\u2019 minister was offending them and also offending the purpose for which they are sitting at the assembly and the purpose for which the Republic of South Sudan is a member of the East African Community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mary Mugyenyi, a Ugandan EALA lawmaker thereafter moved a motion that the Assembly postpones the presentation of the report by EALA\u2019s committee on communication, trade and investment until Kuol shows up and the South Sudanese lawmakers also voted for the motion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, No. 1 Citizen Daily Newspaper\u2019s efforts to reach the South Sudan Minister of Cabinet Affairs, Dr. Martin Elia Lomuro for comment on Minister Deng Alor\u2019s inactiveness in the EAC\u2019s activities were not immediately successful as he couldn\u2019t pick calls and only texted that he was out of the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The New Times highlighted the issues hindering South Sudan integration. <\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the course of their oversight activity, the EALA Committee on South Sudan integration process noted several challenges hindering the country\u2019s progress towards integrating the administration of its Customs into the EAC Customs Union.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Republic of South Sudan\u2019s shift in priority activities which has been geared towards peace and national building as opposed to integration initiatives was one of the elements, the Committee report indicated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then there are disparities in policy, legal and regulatory frameworks in South Sudan with EAC, as well as the fact that the country\u2019s judicial system is based on the Arabic system \u201cwhich makes it challenging\u201d for the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs to incorporate the laws and regulations of the EAC. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lawmakers also observed, among others, that the grace period requested by Juba to commence the implementation of EAC protocols \u2013 particularly the EAC Customs Union instruments \u2013 ended in October 2019 but \u201cSouth Sudan has not formally communicated its request for an extension of the grace period, The New Times, Rwanda reported.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Philip Buda Ladu The East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) has blamed the South Sudan\u2019s Minister of East African Affairs, Deng Alor Kuol for delaying the full integration of South Sudan into the six-member EAC economic bloc. Minister Alor has been accused of nearly two years\u2019 absentia from attending the[Read More…]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[80,79],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-national","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4017"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4019,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4017\/revisions\/4019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onecitizendaily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}