Hopes high ahead of South Sudan vote

Gumbo village located on the outskirts of the city of Juba is one of the areas the worst affected by the civil war in southern Sudan five years ago.

The village, which is deprived of the simplest basics of life, saw things worsened even more by the ravages of the civil war between North and South. The war forced a lot of its people to leave.

Samuel Okalo is one of them but he decided to return to his village a few months ago. He will vote for secession in the upcoming referendum on the South’s future, even though he knows that the separation will not create a perfect state.

“Here there will be no more segregation, segregation of religion, culture and language, though there might be some tribal kind of war but not like with the north,” he says.

It seems likely Samuel will not be alone.

“Preference for the option of secession from the North is not confined to the villages only. It’s also strong in Juba, where the referendum day is already considered an independence day,” says euronews’ correspondant Mohamed Elhamy.

Euronews will be extensively covering the runup to the referendum and the vote itself, which looks increasingly likely to lead to the creation of a new African state, with Juba as its capital.

Copyright © 2012 euronews