South Sudan's referendum on independence, scheduled for January, should be delayed to allow more time to prepare for it, a member of the referendum commission warns.
"The time that is remaining is not enough to hold a referendum," Tarek Osman al-Taher says.
"We at the commission will begin the necessary measures to try to hold the referendum on time but we must warn the partners (that there is not enough time)."
The vote on 9 January, is the culmination of a 2005 peace deal between north- and south-Sudan which ended one of Africa's longest civil war. South Sudan will vote on whether it remains a part of united Sudan or not. Analysts expect it to secede.
Osman al-Taher warns that the registration of voters should be finished three months before the referendum and that there is not enough time to do that. The referendum commission itself was named two years late.
The commissioner warns that to hold the referendum, the commission would either have to skip some key procedures, "which would be unacceptable", or delay the vote. He added that the delay would be no longer than six months.
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However, political science professor Al Tayib Zain al-Abdin at Khartoum University, warned could not take the decision to delay the vote itself.
"The commission cannot postpone the referendum without consulting the government of southern Sudan and the government of national unity in Khartoum," he told RFI.
The ruling party in South Sudan, the Sudan's People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) opposes any type of delay to the vote. Many fear that any delay to the vote would reignite Sudan's civil war and destabilise the East African region.
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