Sudanese lawmakers criticize government over handling of protests

November 6, 2013 (KHARTOUM) – Several lawmakers have criticized the ministry of Interior’s response to the recent protests and said that dozens of Sudanese families are grieving the loss of their sons.

The minister of interior Ibrahim Mahmoud Hamid, who testified before the parliament on Wednesday, rejected accusations that his ministry did not anticipate the recent events and stressed that the police focused on protecting the strategic facilities, pointing that there was no power outage during the events.

He said that the outskirts of Khartoum witnessed sporadic looting and kidnapping incidents following the recent events, pointing that the police has embarked on executing a plan to combat this phenomenon.

Last September, one of the deadliest wave of protests in Sudan’s history erupted against the government decision to cut fuel subsidies and hike prices of gasoline and diesel.

Authorities this week raised the death toll in the protests to 84 from 32 but opposition, human rights organizations, and activists put the death toll at more than 200.

Hamid described drug abuse as the “great danger” which threatens the country and likened it to war, disclosing that the anti-narcotics police filed 3,235 charges against 4,288 suspects in the period from April to October of this year and confiscated 3 kilograms of heroin during the same period.

He acknowledged the government’s inability to collect arms from Darfur states and linked the move to the end of rebellion, stressing the need for achieving peace in Darfur, South Kordofan, and Blue Nile by negotiations or by war.

Hamid said that the security situation in the country has improved overall except in Darfur, South Kordofan, and Blue Nile.

“Several police stations in Kassala state [in eastern Sudan] have not recorded criminal charges for two weeks”, he said

He further pointed that the percentage of money, body, self, and justice obstruction crimes have increased by 1.4% compared to last year, asserting that public decency crimes have decreased by 14.4%.

He predicted the emergence of new types of crime due to cultural overlap, easy transfer of information and knowledge and the technical advancement.

Several MPs noted that gangs are wreaking havoc and demanded the interior ministry to act firmly against careless driving, describing drug abuse within the education institutions as worrying.

They also called for increasing police salaries which they described as “low”.

The ruling National Congress Party (NCP) majority leader, Mahdi Ibrahim, said that police salaries does not cover family needs which weakens morale and called for improving it. He also called for launching intensive campaigns for collecting arms in the capital Khartoum.

MP Ahmed Hagana Mohamed described the road which links Khartoum to Gezira state capital city of Wad Madani as well as 7 other states as the “death road”, calling for widening it to reduce traffic accidents.

(ST)