Al-Mirghani backs Bashir’s presidential run: official
January 8, 2015 (KHARTOUM) – The leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) Mohamed Osman al-Mirghani has endorsed president Omer Hassan al-Bashir bid for a new term, a senior party official announced today.
Some local newspapers in Khartoum spoke of two secret meetings between Bashir and one of al-Mirghani’s sons to discuss the DUP’s position on the elections.
Yesterday, the presidential assistant and NCP deputy chairman Ibrahim Ghandour, disclosed that the DUP has notified his party of its participation in the elections.
Today the cabinet affairs minister Ahmed Sa’ad Omer, who is a DUP official, said that al-Mirghani gave his blessings for Bashir who has led the country since the 1989 military coup he led.
Omer made the revelation during a meeting for the national committee for Bashir’s nomination in Khartoum today that was attended by representatives from political parties, Sufi groups, local leaders along with student, women, youth, sports, media, veterans and artistic figures.
Ghandour said that Bashir’s nomination was endorsed by 23,000 voters while the National Elections Commission (NEC) stipulates that presidential nominees must be endorsed by a minimum of 15,000 voters.
Major opposition parties such as the National Umma Party (NUP) and the Popular Congress Party (PCP) said they will not participate in the elections asserting that the NCP holds absolute control over power and refuses to make any compromise to end the civil war and allow public liberties.
Last month, the chairman of Just Peace Forum (JPF) al-Tayeb Mustafa said that senior NCP officials privately disapprove of plans to hold the elections.
Mustafa, who is Bashir’s maternal uncle, said in his daily column in al-Saiha newspaper he owns, that the NCP is in need of someone to convince it that it is “fighting” a lost battle thus isolating itself even from its own self by insisting on going forward with a lost elections by all standards”.
“I do not mean the financial loss incurred by the people and the nation of 80 billion pounds of which it is in need against starvation and poverty, but I mean the other political loss that is the mostly deadly to its future that its fraught with dangers of devastating catastrophe,” he said.
The JPF head said that he sensed from what he heard from the “heart” of the NCP and some unnamed members of the committee tasked with amending the constitution that they object to the elections being held on time because it conflicts with article 224 of the interim constitution.
But Bashir warned yesterday that the next national government will be formed only from political parties participating in the elections.
He described the justifications provided by the political forces which decided to boycott the upcoming elections as “weak”, noting that the same political forces participated in preparation of the elections law and formation of the electoral commission.
He announced that the NCP will not run in 30% of the electoral constituencies in order to allow other political forces to be represented in the parliament.
(ST)