# Machakos Protocol opens the road to peace (20 July 2002)

URL: https://allhistories.com/sudan/timeline/2002-machakos-protocol-opens-the-road-to-peace
Location: Machakos, Kenya
Themes: main-event

On 20 July 2002 in Machakos, Kenya, Sudan's government and the SPLM/A signed a framework protocol under IGAD mediation. Khartoum accepted that southern Sudanese would hold a referendum on self-determination after a transitional period, while the SPLM accepted that Sharia law would apply in the north. The text set out principles of governance, the right to self-determination and a state-religion arrangement that later talks would flesh out. The protocol broke a long deadlock in a war that had run since 1983 and cost an estimated two million lives, mostly from famine and disease. It came after US pressure and Kenyan mediator Lazaro Sumbeiywo's shuttle diplomacy. Follow-on protocols on security, wealth and power sharing and the three disputed areas were signed at Naivasha between 2003 and 2004. The Machakos text was also the first time Khartoum formally accepted that southerners could choose independence by vote. At the date of this event the principal authority over the largest part of historic Sudan, by the convention of this dataset, lay with Omar al-Bashir, Chairman of the RCC, then President (1989–2019). Machakos created the legal foundation for the 2005 peace agreement and the 2011 referendum, making it the origin of South Sudan's path to statehood. It also showed that sustained outside pressure and mediation could move parties who had fought for nearly two decades.

## Why it matters
It put southern self-determination on the table for the first time in a signed text.

Ruler at the Time: [Omar al-Bashir](https://allhistories.com/sudan/rulers/omar-al-bashir)

## Sources
- [Machakos Protocol](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machakos_Protocol)
- [Second Sudanese Civil War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Sudanese_Civil_War)
- [Comprehensive Peace Agreement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comprehensive_Peace_Agreement)