The Second Sudanese Civil War had begun in 1983 as a response to the status of the underdeveloped South Sudan in relation to the administrative and economic center of Khartoum. The southern rebel groups quickly became dominated by the Sudan People's Liberation Army under John Garang, an ethnic Dinka. However, by the end of the 1980s there was increasing discontent with the lack of any mechanisms to highlight issues within the Movement and seek redress. Widely voiced concerns around this time included that Garang had tied the SPLA too closely with the government of President Mengistu Haile Mariam of Ethiopia in exchange for Ethiopian support and that too many soldiers from Upper Nile and Bahr al-Ghazal had been transferred to be under Garang's direct command along the Equatoria fronts.