History rarely repeats itself identically, yet it often rhymes when political leaders ignore its clearest warnings. Today, South Sudan stands at a dangerous crossroads that mirrors the catastrophic mistakes made by Khartoum in the 1980s. By rushing toward general elections without resolving core constitutional and security prerequisites, Juba risks plunging the nation into endless instability and eventual disintegration.
Lessons from Sudan’s 1986 electoral failure
In the mid-1980s, Sudan was engulfed in the Second Sudanese Civil War, led in the South by Dr. John Garang de Mabior and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A). Following the April 1985 military coup that ousted President Gaafar Nimeiry, northern sectarian parties, including Sadiq al-Mahdi’s Umma Party and the Democratic Unionist Party, pushed aggressively for immediate national elections in April 1986.
From exile in February 1986, former Vice President Joseph Lagu issued a prescient warning to transitional leaders, urging them to halt the polls until foundational national grievances were addressed. Lagu, alongside the SPLM/A and Southern political coalitions, raised three critical arguments against premature elections:
- Active Civil War and Insecurity: Fighting raged across Bahr el Ghazal, Upper Nile, and parts of Equatoria, making voting impossible in most Southern constituencies. Lagu argued that a ballot held while half the country was at war could never be legitimate or representative.
- Unresolved Constitutional Questions: Nimeiry had abrogated the 1972 Addis Ababa Agreement and imposed the September 1983 Sharia laws. Lagu warned that holding elections before repealing those laws and restoring a federal framework for Southern autonomy would permanently entrench northern political dominance.
- Exclusion of Displaced Citizens: Proceeding without a ceasefire and national reconciliation meant disenfranchising millions of displaced Southerners.
Khartoum ignored Lagu’s warnings and proceeded with the April 1986 elections, suspending voting in 37 out of 68 Southern constituencies. As predicted, the resulting government lacked Southern legitimacy, prolonged a brutal war that claimed millions of lives, and ultimately led to Sudan’s breakup in 2011.
The five unfulfilled pillars of the 2018 R-ARCSS
South Sudan is now repeating Khartoum’s exact blunders. Under the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS), signed on September 12, 2018, general elections were designed as the final milestone to conclude the transitional period. However, monitoring bodies like the Reconstituted Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission (RJMEC) and political analysts have documented that five mandatory prerequisites remain unfulfilled:
- Enactment of a Permanent Constitution: Article 1.2.5 and Chapter VI (Articles 6.1–6.13) mandate drafting a federal, democratic permanent constitution before elections, as originally required by Article 1.20.5. Yet drafting has completely stalled, with RJMEC reporting zero progress in late 2026. Instead, the government passed contested amendments in July and September 2026 to delink elections from the permanent constitution.
- Completion of Transitional Security Arrangements: Chapter II (Articles 2.1–2.5) and Article 2.2.1 require a permanent ceasefire, demilitarization of civilian centers, and the full training and redeployment of the Necessary Unified Forces (NUF) under one command. Phase II unification remains incomplete, while active subnational violence and the detention of First Vice President Riek Machar heighten the risk of militarized election violence.
- Conduct of a National Population and Housing Census: Article 1.2.14 mandates a national census before the transition ends to accurately demarcate constituencies. South Sudan has not held a census since 2008, and in July 2026, authorities amended the agreement to defer the census until after the elections, leaving representation tied to disputed historical data.
4. Harmonization of Electoral Laws and Institutional Readiness: Article 1.20 (Sub-articles 1.20.1–1.20.12) governs national elections, requiring the alignment of the Political Parties Act (Article 1.20.1) and National Elections Act (Article 1.20.6) with the constitutional framework, alongside publishing a verified voter register six months before polls (Article 1.20.10). Currently, South Sudan lacks a completed national voter roll. Moreover, the September 2026 amendments to the National Elections Act, which halved the voter register publication window mandated under Article 1.20.10 from six months to three months, bypassed the two-thirds RJMEC endorsement required under Article 8.4 for altering provisions of the agreement.
5. Repatriation and Reintegration of Refugees and IDPs: Chapter III (Articles 3.1.1.6 and 3.2.1) guarantees the safe return of displaced citizens and establishes a Special Fund for Reconstruction (SRF) to rebuild war-torn communities. Millions of South Sudanese remain in refugee camps and domestic displacement sites, compounded by over 420,000 newly displaced people in 2026 alone, while the SRF remains unoperationalized.
Conclusion: A foreseeable collapse
Bypassing these five pillars to stage a rushed election will not deliver democracy; it will formalize an indefinite transition and invite renewed civil war. Just as Khartoum’s refusal to resolve constitutional and security grievances between 1986 and 2005 destroyed a united Sudan, Juba’s disregard for the R-ARCSS threatens the survival of South Sudan as a single state. Without these foundational governance structures in place, the country risks fracturing along its historical regional lines into three separate entities: the republics of Bahr el Ghazal, Upper Nile, and Equatoria. This warning is not rooted in pessimism, but in the undeniable evidence of history and law. If South Sudan’s leaders fail to implement the R-ARCSS before going to the ballot, there will be no South Sudan left to govern.
The writer is a South Sudanese constitutional lawyer, academic, and political figure. He studied law at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, and serves as an independent legal researcher, constitutional expert, lecturer, and Deputy Dean of the College of Law at Starford International University in Juba. He can be reached via nhomngekjuol@gmail.com.
The views expressed in ‘opinion’ articles published by Radio Tamazuj are solely those of the writer. The veracity of any claims made is the responsibility of the author, not Radio Tamazuj.
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