tWEntiEth-CEntuRy CiVil WaRs 213opponents of the Addis Ababa Agreement into the central government
and began the process of the Islamic reform of the Sudan’s laws.
The confirmation in 1979 of the discovery of large oil deposits within
the north-south borderlands of Upper Nile and Kordofan, while offering
the Sudan the prospect of finally escaping its underdevelopment and
indebtedness, paradoxically further undermined the stability initially
brought by the Addis Ababa Agreement. The attempt in 1980 by Hassan
al-Turabi, then Attorney-General in Khartoum, to have the National
Assembly redraw the Southern Region’s borders to include the oil fields
in Kordofan, though unsuccessful in the face of united southern opposi-
tion, was a warning to the south that there were those in Khartoum who
were determined to keep the development of the oil fields firmly under
central, rather than regional, control.
Nimeiri increasingly intervened in the politics of the Southern Region,
dissolving governments, appointing caretaker governments, calling for
new elections, and supporting the idea of re-dividing the Southern
Region into its original three provinces. This idea was first proposed
by Joseph Lagu, resentful of the influence of leaders from Upper Nile
and Bahr al-Ghazal in the Regional Government, in order to promote
Equatorian particularism, but it failed to get the backing of a majority in
the south, and even had considerable opposition in Equatoria. Nimeiri
overrode this opposition when he unilaterally abrogated the Addis Ababa
Agreement in May 1983 and divided the south into three weaker regions.
The removal of the constitutional provisions embodied in the Addis
Ababa Agreement enabled Nimeiri to introduce sharia law through the
National Assembly in September. By this time the civil war in the south
had already begun.
There were a number of lessons that the future SPLM/A leadership
learned from the way the first civil war ended and from the failure of
the Addis Ababa Agreement to bring lasting peace. These lessons had a
lasting impact on the way the SPLM/A was organized and ultimately on
its negotiating strategy. The first lesson was the danger of factionalism
within the exile movement and the guerrilla army. At the outset, therefore,The Sudan Handbook, edited by John Ryle, Justin Willis, Suliman Baldo and Jok Madut Jok. © 2011 Rift Valley Institute and contributors the SPLA subordinated the political to the military wing and resolutely
(www.riftvalley.net).