Africa Is another South Sudan possible?

Abstract

Through sourcing data from documentary sources and adopting descriptive and historical methods of data analysis, this article undertakes to determine a prognosis for the prospect of further mutation in Africa’s political map after South Sudan, against the backdrop of recent waves of secessionist movements on the continent. It argues that while the exceptional trajectory of South Sudan’s independence might continue to embolden existing secessionist groups and would-be secessionist groups across Africa, given that the emotive idea of selfdetermination would not disappear, it is not likely to open a floodgate of secession states. It concludes that as long as the forces and conditions that drove the 1964 Cairo Declaration are still alive and formidable, coupled with the fact that the majority of contemporary secessionist movements are unable to pose credible threats to the status quo, the prospects of another South Sudan in Africa in the foreseeable future are slim.