Nearly three million to vote in south Sudan referendum

Almost three million people are now registered to vote in the south Sudan referendum on 9 January, vote organisers announced Wednesday at the end of the voter registration. Although scheduled to close one week before, officials extended the two-week period seven more days to handle the high demand of registering people in the south.

Reuters/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah

"The registration process has been a success and has been peaceful," said Aleu Garang Aleu, the spokesperson for the Southern Sudan Referendum Bureau.

He added that the final count will be established in the following days since reports are still being gathered from more remote centres.

About five million south Sudanese were eligible to register to vote. This included those from the south livinig in the north and 50,000 to two million people who live abroad.

Registration in the north and abroad were low. Those eligible included permanent residence of south Sudan since 1956, the year of Sudan's independence from Britain, and those who can trace their ancestry to an establish south Sudan tribe.

The referendum satisfies one of the parts of the 2005 peace deal between the north and south Sudan. Voters will go to the polls to decided whether to remain with Khartoum or to become an independent country.

US State Department spokesperson Philip Crowley called the vote one of the most compelling stories for 2011. "If this goes well, it has the ability to [...] have a very positive effect in the region [...] if it goes badly we understzand there is a significant risk of a return to civil war," he said.