{{The South Sudanese faction of the ruling Sudan People\u2019s Liberation Movement (SPLM), which has formed an \u201carmed resistance\u201d against president Salva Kiir\u2019s government, said the 12 former colleagues freed from detention in Juba including the former secretary general of the party, Pagan Amum, have not decided which side to join in resolving the new nation\u2019s five-month old conflict.}}<\/p>\n
\u201cThe former detainees have not yet made up their minds about which side to join. In recent consultations with our leadership in Addis Ababa, they felt they needed more time to think over it whether to remain neutral or join us or the other side,\u201d Machar\u2019s spokesperson James Gatdet Dak told media on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Under the leadership of the former vice-president and the then deputy chairman of the ruling SPLM, Riek Machar, the now SPLM (in opposition) have been battling Kiir\u2019s government since mid-December 2013.<\/p>\n
The group include Pagan Amum, former SPLM secretary general, Mama Robecca Nyandeng, presidential advisor and widow of late leader John Garang, Deng Alor, former cabinet affairs minister, John Luk, former justice minister, Kosti Manibe, former finance minister, Oyai Deng, former security minister, Gier Chuang, former minister for roads, Madut Biar, former minister of telecommunications, Majak Agot, former deputy defense minister, Cirino Hiteng, former youth minister, Chol Tong, former Lakes state governor and Ezekiel Lol, former diplomat to US.<\/p>\n
Prior to the 15 December violence which erupted in South Sudan last year, the politicians who are senior members in the SPLM, were allied to the former party deputy chairman, Riek Machar, in which they on 6 December 2013 held a press conference in Juba, calling for political reforms in the party and accusing the party chairman, Salva Kiir of \u201cdictatorial tendencies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Following the violence, they were all arrested, except Robecca Nyandeng. Seven of them were released two months later, but Pagan Amum, Oyai Deng, Majak Agot and Ezekiel Lol remained in detention, accused of alleged coup attempt. They were, however, released five months later for lack of evidences to support the alleged coup.<\/p>\n
The first seven released former detainees however played an insignificant, sometimes denied, neutral position in the peace talks, calling themselves a \u201cthird bloc\u201d which did not want to join either side in the conflict, despite being named by Machar as members of his delegation and demanded for their release throughout the peace talks.<\/p>\n
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{{The South Sudanese faction of the ruling Sudan People\u2019s Liberation Movement (SPLM), which has formed an \u201carmed resistance\u201d against president Salva Kiir\u2019s government, said the 12 former colleagues freed from detention in Juba including the former secretary general of the party, Pagan Amum, have not decided which side to join in resolving the new nation\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2000052285,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[99],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-14543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-greatlakesnews","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":{"id":2000052285,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14543.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14543.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14543.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14543.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14543.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14543.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000052285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14543"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=14543"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=14543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}