Sudan mourns musical legend Mohamed Wardi

February 19, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – Tens of thousands of Sudanese citizens, including President Omer Al-Bashir attended the burial ceremony of iconic singer Mohamed Wardi who passed away on Saturday night after a long struggle with kidney complications.

Sudan’s most famous singer died at the age of 83 in a Khartoum hospital, Sudan’s official news agency SUNA announced in a somber statement on Saturday.

He was buried on Sunday at Al-Farouq cemetery in Khartoum where tens of thousands of peoples, including President Al-Bashir, gathered to pay their respects.

Wardi left Sudan into self-imposed exile after Al-Bashir seized power in a military coup in 1989. He returned in 2002 to a popular reception and vowed to oppose dictatorship.

“I am a human being, and every human being is against dictatorship and I will continue to denounce it,” he said in an interview with AFP in June 2002.

Wardi left a legacy of patriotic songs about freedom and revolutions. He sang in Arabic as well as in his Nubian dialect

(ST)