Juba, 14 February, 2020 / 1:25 am (ACI Africa).
With just over one week to the formation of a transitional government of national unity in South Sudan, a Catholic Bishop of Yei has called upon Christians to pray for peace during the ongoing negotiations between conflicting parties in the country.
“The period of the extension of the peace agreement is coming to an end and I think our responsibility is prayer so that the ceasefire holds and the negotiations continue in peace,” Bishop Erkolano Lodu Tombe told congregation that gathered at Christ the King Cathedral in Yei on Sunday February 9.
Formation of South Sudan’s transitional government has been slated for February 22.
Signed in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa in September 2018, the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS) provided for the rebels to join the transitional government and the settling of a number of disputes, including the number of regional states the country should have and their boundaries.
However, President Salva Kiir and rebel leader Riek Machar missed to establish a power-sharing government in November last year, agreeing in a meeting that was mediated by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni and Sudan's interim leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, to push back the formation of the new administration by 100 days.
