S. Sudan Parliament Strips Machar, Allies Of Membership

The South Sudan National Legislative Assembly on Tuesday stripped sacked vice president and rebel leader Riek Machar, his deputy Alfred Ladu Gore, and 21 of his allies of their parliamentary membership.



"These members have individually contravened… the national assembly's [bylaws regulating the] conduct of business," said Charles Wello Onyany, chairman of parliament's committee on members' affairs, while raising the motion.



The MPs in question have missed 13 consecutive parliamentary sessions.  



"I humbly ask your honor to ask this august house to approve this request for these MPs to lose their membership," Onyany said, addressing the speaker.



The motion was not debated further, with the house calling on the speaker to issue a ruling.



"The law is very clear. It is the conduct of business which guides the parliament," Speaker Manasseh Magok Rundial declared in his ruling.



"When a member misses 12 sessions without permission from the speaker, he automatically loses his seat," the top lawmaker added.



Machar had represented Leer County in Unity State, while Gore had represented Juba County in Central Equatoria State.



South Sudan has been shaken by violence since last December, when President Salva Kiir accused Machar of plotting to overthrow his regime.



Hundreds of thousands of South Sudanese have since been displaced in fighting between the two rivals, leading to an increasingly dire humanitarian situation for large swathes of the country's population.



In recent months, the warring camps have held on-again, off-again peace talks in Addis Ababa under the auspices of Djibouti-based East African trade bloc IGAD.



Representatives of both sides are currently in Addis Ababa to discuss implementation of a June agreement to draw up a transitional government.



By Okech Francis



englishnews@aa.com.tr



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