Landmark vote: South Sudanese vote en masse in referendum

Africa’s largest country faces split in two.

JUBA, SUDAN: Vast crowds of jubilant south Sudanese voted on Sunday in a landmark referendum expected to see the largely non-Muslim region splitting away from the Arab-led north to create Africa’s newest nation, forcing many polling stations to stay open late into the evening.

Organisers acknowledged the queues were too long and th at women and the elderly were given no preference on the first day of the seven-day vote.

Britain, Norway and the United States, the three main Western brokers of the Sudan’s north-south peace process, welcomed President Omar al-Bashir’s pledge to respect the result of the vote, which they termed a “historic step.”

“We are encouraged by the strong public commitments of both Presidents Bashir and Kiir to continue negotiations on post-referendum issues and to foster cooperation between the north and south,” they said.

But they highlighted their “deep concerns” about the situation in Abyei.

“We commend the people of Abyei for their patience in recent months... and we emphasise again to both parties their responsibilities to urgently resolve the impasse,” top diplomats of the three countries said in a joint statement.

Thousands of voters had begun waiting from early hours, eager to be among the first to have their say on whether the impoverished south should finally break away from rule by Khartoum.

While the first day of voting was mostly peaceful, an official said clashes between renegade militiamen and south Sudanese troops disrupted voting in part of the key oil Unity state, which abuts the north-south border.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 10^th, 2011.