Northern ultranationalist party to sue SPLM’s Arman with “treason”

March 30, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – A northern political party advocating extreme nationalistic agendas is preparing to file a lawsuit against the Secretary-General of the SPLM’s northern sector, Yasir Arman, on the grounds of his calls on the US Administration not to lift economic sanctions on Sudan.

Al-Tayeb Mustafa, the ultranationalist leader of the Just Peace Forum (JPF), which preaches against the influence of African Sudanese on the Islamic and Arab identity of the Sudan, said his party had formed a team of lawyers to instigate legal proceedings against Arman on the charge of “treason.”

Arman, who leads north Sudan sector of the ruling SPLM in South Sudan, called on the US administration during a visit to Washington not to lift economic sanctions imposed on Sudan since 1997 until Khartoum demonstrates commitment to democratic transformation.

His statement drew an angry response from the Sudanese government whose spokesman Khalid Musa who said Arman’s statements constituted “a breach of national agendas, calling on the SPLM to repudiate them.

Speaking to Sudan’s official news agency SUNA on Wednesday, Mustafa said that the team of lawyers was currently engaged in preparing the case, calling on all lawyers wishing to join the team to register their name with the JPF’s administration.

Al-Tayeb Mustafa, who happens to be the maternal uncle of Sudan’s President Al-Bashir, chairs the board of directors of the JPF-affiliated daily newspaper Al-Initbaha in which Mustafa writes a daily column often containing derogatory remarks against Arman and other figures from south Sudan and Darfur.

Mustafa is accused of using his paper to spread xenophobia against people from African ethnic backgrounds in Sudan.

(ST)