From: Paul Nyandoto

Basir was drunk when he mentioned that. If not then he is afraid of ICC (Hagua) thing or he is now scared by the wave of change taking place in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya etc. It looks that all his fellow dictators friends in Northern African arabic states are going to be kicked off. The man is just too scared, where will he run to incase the same danger starts in Sudan and ICC is also behind him?.

Paul Nyandoto

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sent by “Chakubuta Mulengwa”

By Africa correspondent Ginny Stein, wires

Sudan president Omar al-Bashir has pledged his support for a new southern state in his first public statement since the south of the country voted overwhelmingly to split from the north.

While the poll is yet to be officially declared, provisional results have shown almost 99 per cent of southerners voted to secede.

Many feared the north would not let the oil-producing south go without a fight.

President al-Bashir said he accepted secession has become a reality, and that rather than being sad about the outcome, he would go to the south to join in the celebrations.

“Secession has become a reality and it has been accepted,” he said.

“Ninety-nine percent of southerners have chosen secession. But we’re not going to mourn. I repeat what I have said before: We will go to the south to celebrate with them.

“Secession is not the end of history. It is a new beginning,”

Initial results are now due to be announced in Khartoum at the end of this month.

Mr Bashir, who led a war against the south for a decade-and-a-half before signing the peace deal, had already told senior southern officials that he would respect the vote’s outcome, during a rare visit to regional capital Juba shortly before the referendum.