South Sudan was a country born out of conflict and the first year of its independence has been clouded in difficulty; with its relationship with Sudan and economic future the main problems facing the country at the moment.
On the 9th July 2011 South Sudan gained independence from Sudan creating the world’s newest country in the heart of Africa. However there was much controversy in the build up to independence which was brought about after decades of ethnic and religious conflict between the Arabic/Muslim population in the North and the African/Christian population in the South. South Sudan contains most of the oil resources in the country, a major source of income and investment from nations, such as China. With independence Sudan has lost 75% of the oil and tensions between the two nations have centred around the oil rich regions, such as Abyei, which exist on the border and contain vast quantities of the highly prized resources.
This relationship continues to dominate the foreign relations of the South Sudan and many of South Sudan’s other neighbours, including Uganda, have pledged support to President Salva Kiir in his dealings with Khartoum and President Omar al-Bashir, a leader who is becoming increasingly isolated, both within African and global politics.
With this guarantee of support from African leaders South Sudan’s position in central African politics appears more secure, however if Sudan decides to escalate its military action it may fundamentally threaten the stability of the world’s newest state, which lacks the military power to take on the might of its Northern neighbour and the political strength to recover from an armed conflict.
However South Sudan does not simply have to think about its political future; in order to function effectively as a nation it has to look to its economic future. Although it has 75% of Sudanese oil supplies it lacks the infrastructure to extract and transport the oil and thus cannot make an effective profit on this resource. They, as a landlocked country, have a difficult task to ship the extracted oil and thus must rely on their neighbours, including Sudan, who export most of their oil through the coastal city of Port Sudan. Disagreements over transit fees. however, have caused a halt in South Sudanese oil exports and thus intensified the economic pressures in the country.
With heavy investment from nations such as China, who are looking to secure their energy futures, the potential to develop the economic infrastructure is huge and so the economic future many improve for South Sudan, although overcoming the poverty and economic problems in this African nation will prove to be difficult. South Sudan’s economy was certainly the focus of President Kiir’s speech on the anniversary in which he called for the ‘economic independence’ of the country, which many analysts have taken as a sign that South Sudan wants to distance itself from Sudan.
The future for South Sudan is clearly difficult, with economic and political issues defining the future for the African state. The oil industry and its relationship with Sudan will be the focus for many in Africa and around the world that have a vested interest in the future development of the World’s newest state.
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