The leader of the National Democratic Movement (NDM), Lam Akol Ajawin has called on opposition parties to participate in the upcoming elections slate for December 2024, despite delays in establishing critical mechanisms to level the ground.
“We must go for elections in 2024 under any circumstances, if we cannot implement all pending tasks, we have to see a way because at the end of the day we must conclude with elections,” Akol told journalists at his party headquarter in the Thongpiny suburb of Juba on Thursday.
Akol arrived into the country this week after spending years in exile, following his resignation in 2016 from the transitional government where he served as the minister of agriculture and food security.
“The objective of any party is to strive to get into government through elections, what political parties need is freedom of movement, freedom of expression and freedom to carry out campaigns, you cannot be told to campaign,” he said.
Akol said differences in political ideology among political parties should not be misconstrued by those wielding power for enmity as is the case today.
“We caution that the political differences between various political parties are not enmity, it is a matter of ideas and a clash of programs not a clash of personalities,” he said.
“We have already made compromises in the 2018 peace agreement, why not towards the last phase in the implementation of the peace agreement,”Akol said.
