South Sudan president Salva Kiir gave his strongest hint yet he would vote to declare independence from the north in a looming referendum, stoking tensions 100 days ahead of the sensitive plebiscite.

Kiir told thousands of supporters in the southern capital Juba he would not vote for unity as nothing had been done to make unity attractive, increasing pressure on already deeply troubled relations with northern leaders who are campaigning for the two halves of the country to stay together.

People from Sudan's oil-producing south were promised a vote on whether to secede or stay in Sudan in a 2005 peace deal that ended decades of north-south civil war.

Risk
Arrangements for the vote have fallen behind schedule and analysts have warned there is a risk of a return to conflict if the vote is delayed or disrupted.

Southerners, embittered by the war, are widely expected to vote for independence, but Kiir's Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) has up to now stuck to the official line agreed in the 2005 accord, that they would try to make unity attractive and leave the final decision to the people of the south.

The vote is highly sensitive in the north because most of the country's oil reserves, responsible for up to 45 percent of state revenues, lie in the south. Northern and southern leaders have so far not reached an agreement on how they would share oil revenues after a split.

"I have my own assessment, and I can say what I have observed by myself ... I can say if I was to vote alone for unity or the secession or independence of southern Sudan, I would not vote for unity because I have not seen what attracted me to unity," Kiir said.

Voting intentions
Senior Kiir aide Joseph Klato said the president had not meant to discuss his own voting intentions, but merely to point out that southerners had so far not been given any compelling reasons to support continued union with the north.

But a senior official in the north's dominant National Congress Party (NCP) said it was "totally unacceptable" Kiir had now clearly come out for separation.

Rabie Abdelati accused Kiir of trying to influence southerners, called on him to withdraw the comments and repeated earlier threats from NCP ministers that the party might not recognise the referendum if the SPLM tried to force a separation vote.

Kiir, speaking after returning from a trip to the United States, said he would not accept any delay to the scheduled start of the referendum.

"Our partners in the north showed very little interest or activity to make unity a realistic proposition. At the moment, all signs point to the fact that on January 9th, 2011, southern Sudanese people will vote overwhelmingly for independence," read an English transcript of Kiir's speech in Arabic.

Source: Reuters