Would the Sudanese undertake another popular uprising?

By Mahgoub El-Tigani

October 26, 2008 — Major reactions by Sudanese civil society forces to the government-controlled People of Sudan Initiative on Darfur this last week at Kenana were extremely negative. The conference was largely attended by government pro-parties. Bound with the ruling party by at least two strategic agreements, however, the Umma National Party co-leading conference member maintained a critical stand versus the government policies to resolve the crisis.

THE KENANA GOVERNMENTAL CONFERENCE

Aimed to consolidate government plans via a wide range of discussions with the larger community, the conference was not held to produce “a final solution” to the crisis. And yet, the committees of the conference discussed a wide range of issues, reconciliations, public relations, development, refugees, and security (Sudan Tribune: October 24). The conference engaged in lengthy discussions as well on the administrative future of Darfur, whether it might be unified as one region or divided into sub-regions.

Unfortunately, the conference evolved into a vicious circle, as it desperately tried to gather every bit of “the President’s insistence in peace,” “embrace of national unity,” “abhorrence of foreign intervention,” and the other pre-emptive slogans or non-existent achievements of the ruling party; the absence of the hard-line opposition groups, led by the Darfuri civil society and armed movements, reduced the conference climates to “nothing but unabated government propaganda.”

From the very beginning, the proceedings of the conference were not quite harmonious: The NCP expedited the conference meetings. But the SPLM peace partner of the ruling party exhibited a clear distance from the NCP exclusionary stands against the Darfuri opposition. Earlier, Secretary General Pagan Amum stressed repeatedly the unity of the Darfuris to ensure national equalitarian negotiations without government patronage or security offensive.

The Kenana conference was seen as a “dead body” since the government failed to ensure participation of the frontline opposition Darfuris, namely the independent democracy and human rights groups and the armed movements of the region. This critique was additionally voiced by many political parties that did not participate in the conference, including the Communists and the al-Mutamar al-Sha’bi NIF opposition parties.

The failure of the government-controlled conference to include these groups rendered it impossible to claim “the national coverage” President al-Bashir and his ruling party excitingly announced in the national and international media. The Umma strategic alliance with the NCP, however, supplied a great comfort to the internationally indicted president and his NCP partisan agenda to which key Darfuri civilian groups and armed movements were harshly opposed.

With an open eye to the Qatari Initiative to bring together all Sudanese groups in a national reconciliation conference similar to the successful initiative of Qatar which (effectively supported by both regional and international powers on the basis of full equalitarian participation of the Lebanese civil society and armed groups) resolved the government-opposition conflict in Lebanon, Sadiq al-Mahdi and the Umma delegates apparently made an attempt to prepare the grounds for the Qatari Initiative.

Emphasizing the need for greater sharing in government affairs by liberating the State from repressive laws and security abuses, the Umma opted, in general, for a peaceful settlement to the crisis in Darfur by active participation of parties to the conflict to secure the next elections, instead of the government’s one-party operations.

The Sudanese watched with growing suspicions the real intentions of the conference. Linked to a presidential attempt to deflect public concerns with the government’s political failures and financial corruption, many criticized the wasteful expenditures of the Initiative. The opposition groups were dissatisfied, the conference budget was unnecessarily wasted to boost the failing presidency of Omer al-Bashir under the escalated pressures of the International Criminal Court Prosecutor General and the non-reconciliatory stands of the Darfuri movements.

As an alternative, the opposition seemed to sustain a unified position criticizing the local component thus far wasted in government propaganda, and asking, as a top priority, to channel all available funds, added to those expected from foreign aid (to be processed without interruption by military troops or militias) to help return the victimized citizens of Darfur from the camps to their homelands. The latter have been criminally misappropriated by the government’s unlawful acquisitions in the natives’ lands.

The conference critics stressed the need to implement well-known agenda of a viable political settlement for the crisis, namely the convening of an All-Sudanese national conference that must be indiscriminately attended by the full representation of the Darfuri civil society groups and armed movements, side-by-side with the Sudanese government and opposition parties, under the auspices of the United Nations, the African Union, and the Arab League, besides the Friends of Sudan, the United States of America and the European Union.

Composed of this structure, the promised conference, unlike the Kenana governmental demonstration, would be able to guarantee full autonomous rule for Darfur, effective sharing of wealth and power in the center-Darfur relations, immediate re-acquisitions by the Darfuri natives of their dispossessed lands, full compensation for the innocent victims of the crisis, and the prosecution of all criminals of war by independent judiciary, etc. Earlier in 2008, the United States Institute of Peace meetings with North America Darfuri Intellectuals provided a significant agenda on this vital program.

These anti-government agenda “could never have been seriously discussed, let alone approved as a working plan, in the absence of the Darfuri civil society and armed movements together with those parties, organizations, and national personalities that continue to support, in principle, the legitimate struggles of people versus government assaults in pursuance of a peaceful permanent and fair settlement in the region and the national arena,” reiterated most opposition papers throughout the days of the Kenana meetings.

Meticulously controlling State functions vis-à-vis the civil society activities, President al-Bashir, his deputy ‘Ali Osman, and their security chiefs have been largely responsible for the political and socio-economic policies of the ruling party in the national level, as well as the policies of the Government of Sudan in conflict with the international arena. The Kenana gathering is not an exception.

In two decades, the tactics adopted by the NIF/NCP single-party presidential system enforced authoritative political and economic practices that 1) frustrated the civil society’s potential to develop a national political movement to support the CPA; 2) abused the State authorities to stay in power by non-popular projects with several non-democratic circles; and 3) restricted effective international support to the People of Sudan in their unrelenting struggles to accomplish a stable regular democracy constitutionally committed to the internationally-recognized human rights and fundamental freedoms.

Interestingly, the worsening failures of the NIF/NCP government generated “a crystallizing hostility” to the ruling party plans with respect to the upcoming elections along the days of the Kenana gathering: Angered by the government’s selective list of representatives of the parties’ council in the National Assembly, which might be replicated in the next formulation of the national elections’ committee, Hatim El-Sir, the National Democratic Alliance spokesperson, suggested “a national coalition government” instead of the existing government “if the elections is not timely held.”

THE OCTOBER REVOLUTION

Coincidentally during the Kenana government meetings, the Sudanese re-echoed the glorious memory of the October Revolution 1964, which occurred in similar conditions to the faltering situation of the country, as it prevails today under the tyranny of the NIF/NCP picked-up “majority parliamentarians” and security managers.

The political upheaval that had earlier brought about the October national successful uprising in 1964 versus the army generals’ rule (1958-64) encouraged the Sudanese thenceforth to enforce another political movement in the March/April 1985 Uprising, which toppled the Ja’far Nimeiri 17-years of dictatorial rule. The October Uprising, however, acted as a spiritual political motive for the April Uprising in 1986, and the October’s legacy still inspires the Sudanese people at large.

The October 1964 Uprising, however, was not a full-fledged social revolution: The uprising was not able to sustain the new political order of the Jabhat al-Hiat, the Professionals’ Front which succeeded the generals’ military rule by a coalition government of the trades unions and the professional groups that had diligently initiated and led the movement.

For the October Uprising to continue as a successful social revolution, it should have maintained a long-enduring political organization throughout the transitional period up to the construction phase of the movement. The organization in question should have been capable of eradicating the old system of rule; building a new system in its place; and maintaining the new regime to work out the political, economic, and cultural programs of the stage.

Judged by the one-year difficult handling of October to the tasks of replacing the generals’ system of rule by the Hiat transitional period, one can only conclude in the fact that October 1964 was a successful “uprising;” but it was never transformed into a complete “revolution.”

The successful counter attacks by parties never interested in the October program, added to a quick fix for a continuous return to the generals’ central bureaucracy at expense of the marginal regions, ended the October drive to implement progressive ideas to guarantee the South regional autonomous rule and to reform the political, economic, and cultural life of the country.

October was not a revolution because it did not accomplish what the social revolutions achieved in other parts of the world. For example, the French Revolution removed the monarchy and instated democratic governance in its place, and the American Revolution pulled America out of the European colonialism, all together. The October Uprising did not accomplish what the Russian Revolution or the Chinese Revolution achieved by founding alternative systems of rule for the largest segments of the population in place of the former unpopular governance.

LESSONS FROM OCTOBER

The lessons drawn from the October Uprising might probably move the Sudanese people to another massive uprising in the contemporary life, as long as the conditions needed for a popular movement would be fairly mature. Such conditions include essentially the strong presence of a capable political organization to rally popular support for a widely acceptable national program of change to the extent necessary to remove a given regime from the seats of power in order to establish a new popular system.
The “October Revolution,” as the Sudanese adoringly named it, was not fully executed to the extent of accomplishing the promised ends. The popular zeal for change was oppressed; the people’s chosen government was usurped; and a quick come-back was rushed by the counter forces of October, only to pave the way to the May military coup in 1969.
Social revolutions never come about by a military decree “to install a socialist state by a single-party-single-candidate tyranny,” as the Ja’far Nimeiri military junta and his Arab nationalist young officers imposed in 1969. Nor would a national movement of the sort materialize with the Nimeiri’s twin coup, al-Bashir-Turabi Salvation Revolution, in the service of a false Islamic Caliphate.
The sustenance of successful national movements, however, occur with highly anticipated calculations, long-term national struggles, principled leaderships, and unwavering determination by the largest sections of the populace, who cease to see their fortune in existing regimes, to change the corrupted systems of rule.
These civil forces would have to break daringly into the streets to manifest their will to implement programs of social justice and the good life. Successful national movements must equally move on by a competent unified leadership to which the failing rulers would have to stand powerlessly before a just and fair trial for their wrongful policies and unlawful deeds.
THE NORTH-SOUTH ROUND-TABLE CONFERENCE

The failure of the Kenana government venture suggests further that the October lessons are recycling in the present time: The Round Table Conference (16-25 March 1965) “was held in Khartoum… in the wake of the October Revolution, and was the first such meeting in post-independence Sudan to confront directly the issue of the future of the southern Sudan within the Republic of Sudan… Since civil war had already been waged for a decade, the question of separation or integration of the South was inevitably at the center of discussions,” says the 3rd edition of the Historical Dictionary of The Sudan.

Lobban et al stated that, “All of the northern parties present, including the Umma party, Peoples Democratic party, Sudanese Communist party, the National Unionist Party (NUP), and Islamic Charter Front, refused to accept the separation of the Sudan; while the southern parties, including the Southern Front and the Sudanese African National Union (SANU), were divided over the issue. While the Sudan Unity Party, a wing of SANU led by Santino Deng, stood for a united Sudan, the Southern Front, members of SANU in exile, and Anya-Nya favored separation…”

Sudanese academic sources (Mohamed Saeed al-Gaddal essays in al-Midan, for instance) might have well agreed with Lobban and his associates’ report in the Sudan Dictionary “The final proposals of the northern parties included: recognition of the right to self-determination in the South, but not secession or the right to pursue an agenda leading to a sovereign southern state; advocacy of the principle of regional government and rejection of both highly centralized and federated forms of government as inappropriate to the realities of the Republic of Sudan; and implementation of an immediate cease-fire.”

Most interestingly, the southerners’ final proposals at the Round Table Conference were quite different from the northerners’ final proposals. The Dictionary says, “By way of comparison, the final proposals of SANU and the Southern Front included: a program of southernization of politics and administration with a division of powers and institutions between the northern and southern regions; integrated transport, post, and telegram services to serve as points of articulation with the North; a Council of Ministers, twelve from each territory, selected to govern the Republic.”

“Six resolutions to attempt to normalize the situation in the southern Sudan were jointly signed by the aforementioned eight political parties or organizations that were represented at the conference. These resolutions had little effect; in the months following the conference the newly elected government coming to power in July 1965 pursued a military offensive against Anya-Nya and worked with those southerners who favored unity.”

The exclusionary agenda of the Kenana Conference were obviously a non-conscientious fear of a Darfur move to assume complete independence from the central government of Khartoum, as was equally voiced in the government papers in these days of a possible move by the South to adopt a separate state from the North by referendum.

The October Round Table Conference laid on the table all the possibilities without fear, which helped to develop both South and North agenda of national unity. Significantly true, the CPA elevated the concerns for national unity to a high constitutional possibility if all provisions would be truthfully implemented by all parties, especially the Central Government. And yet, the Kenana Conference defaulting mannerism recollected the government failures in the CPA implementation, which would make it impossible for the national or international efforts, including the Qatari Initiative, to help to resolve the crisis in Sudan decisively without full participation by all civil society groups and armed movements.

THE AFTERMATH OF OCTOBER 1964

In the 4 decades that passed after the 1965 Round Table Conference, the Sudanese State has not changed in any genuine way from the generals’ bureaucratic-authoritative government: Khartoum continues to rule the regions with a central system of governance in which the Sudan treasury is largely controlled by the ruling party/security forces through an appointed officer in the Republican Palace (in the case of dictatorial rule) or a council of ministers (in the case of a democratically elected government). Important changes took place in the Sudanese mode of resistance.

The northern well-established trades unions and progressive political parties (especially the Sudanese Communist Party) lost momentum and lingered behind under heavy assaults by the generals, Nimeiri, and al-Bashir repressive regimes. Advocating the establishment of a New Sudan with an advanced amalgam of the Round Table resolutions, the southerners sprang up with a progressive movement led by the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement (SPLM).

The idea eloquently promoted by John Garang about a New Sudan based on equalitarian citizenship was not purely new: The idea had been voiced in different versions by Mahmoud Mohamed Taha, William Deng, Abd al-Khaliq Mahgoub, Joseph Garang, and General Fathi Ahmed Ali, among others, in several literary works or political statements.

The new fact about the SPLM, however, was that: “Unlike previous southern movements the SPLA clarified at the outset that it was not a separatist movement, but that its role was the liberation of the whole of the Sudanese people from the “tyranny of military dictatorship,” uneven economic development, and chronic civil war. Thus, the movement represented a new stage in the political development of the South, and the SPLM has attracted to its cadre some northern Sudanese intellectuals,” says the Historical Dictionary.

How much similar is the situation today in October 2008 with that occurring in the wake of the October Uprising 1964?

Have the ruling groups paved the path for the Darfuri movements, the Northern Nubians and Manasir, and the East Sudan groups to participate on equal basis in the governance of the State?

Has the NIF/NCP identified itself, as yet, as a transitional government to prepare the country for democratic elections, not any eternal rule by military might and security surveillance?

Have the political parties of the North adjusted to the CPA constitutional provisions to concur with a real exercise of the right to self-determination by the South? Have they given up the fears they have always suspected the South might willingly reject the North-South unity?

OCTOBER 2008

The situation in the Sudan today is quite complex: a dictatorship continues to rule under rags of Islamic symbols by State powers in close collaboration with an anti-Sudanese ideological and material support by the International Islamic Movement and careless Arab nationalist intellectuals and/or organizations, while strict exclusionary policies, in actual fact, inhibit all non-governmental civil society groups and political parties from a fair share in the decision making of the Nation.

The Sudanese popular movement is suffering heavy attacks by the NIF/NCP ruling elite (the security, the army, the police, and militias shielded by an arsenal of enforceable laws). The progressive political parties (SPLM, the Communists, and USAP, etc.) and the trades unions’ and professionals’ associations are suffering in varying degrees the burden of civil wars, as well as stringent security measures that allow very little space for the application of democratic measures in the daily life of people.

The DUP and the Umma liberal and/or conservative parties are down trodden by internal divisions and a state of meager financing in their party machineries that also reduce the leverage of party leaderships over the political arena.

The only group possessive of authority and the Sudan Treasury monies free of accountability (despite incriminating reports by the Auditor-General from June 1989 to the present time) is the NIF/NCP ruling junta, which insist on staying in power via the same policies and practices that have always made of Sudan “the sick state of the Continent of Africa and the Arab world.”

The opposition umbrella, the National Democratic Alliance, is not a revolutionary political organization. The NDA is a coalition of conservative and progressive groups agreed on a common program to remove the existing dictatorial regime, in the first place. Still supporting the CPA, the NDA aims to establish permanent peace with a fair system of center-region governance in compliance with international norms.

With these aims, the NDA maintained some elements of the Round Table resolutions. The NDA, nonetheless, failed to mobilize the Sudanese masses since many NDA leaderships joined the NIF/NCP hand-picked parliament, thus jeopardizing their political careers by the gloomy shadows of the ruling domain under the NIF/NCP controlled government.

Based on the fact that the CPA provided a possible program of action to guarantee a stable national unity between all parts of the country, what programs the government thus far applied to build up the bridges of confidence between the victimized regions and the victimizing center? Despite the NIF/NCP restrictive measures, the SPLM, the NDA, and the other change agents will have to exercise effective programs to win the popular movement.

CONTRADICTORY FOREIGN POLICIES

The Sudan’s foreign affairs in October 2008 are quite different from the October 1964 situation. Forty years ago, the Cold War Era allowed the Sudanese groups, whether conservative or progressive, to seek closer relations with the Soviet Union and the United States superpowers to strike a balance needed for the Third World Countries to coexist with the global entities of the time.

The generals’ government was aware of this reality. Hence, the late Ahmed Khair, a highly-esteemed nationalist intellectual who became the foreign minister of the regime, was able to make several deals with the Soviet Union (to clear the cotton sale crisis), while maintaining close economic and political relations with the USA and Egypt under the strong leadership of Jamal ‘Abd al-Nasir.

The Nimeiri governance (1965-1969) severed relations with the West before it turned to sever relations with the East – all with a high cost, which finally brought the nation into the hands of the anti-democratic Islamic Movement. Nimeiri completed the generals’ notorious haunting of trades unions. He escalated further the civil war by religious laws, and annexed the Sudanese foreign policy to the policies of Sadat.

At some point, the NIF/NCP tried with little success to turn the wheel of the Muslim Brotherhood hostilities against the pro-Western neighbors of Sudan, in particular, into an open-ended foreign policy, one pragmatically pursuing business relations (through oil fortunes basically) with China and Iran aspirant governments in the region, in addition to a number of pro-Western Gulf States.

In the latest news, China urged the Sudanese parties and armed movements to come together to resolve the crisis, which is essentially important. The Chinese commitment to strengthen the repressive nature of the ruling regime by arms’ sales and diplomatic support, instead of encouraging the NIF/NCP to respect the fundamental rights and freedoms of people, however, will not help the necessary pressures on the ruling party to comply with that urge.

The sacking of Turabi and the Mutamar Sha’bi elements from government positions did allow stronger relations between the ruling regime and the Islamic businesses in a number of Arab and Muslim nations, including Egypt. The political schism in between the NIF groups, however, did not improve the position of the indicted president.

Paradoxically, the new foreign policy strides in economic terms failed to put up with the uncompromising contradictions between the radical Islamic Iran and the pro-Western Egypt and the other Arab Sates. The same foreign policy failed completely to end the unabated hostilities between the SPLM Pan African orientations, the regime’s peace partner, on the one hand, and the Arab nationalism and Islamic universalism of the NIF/NCP on the other.

Roaming unwisely between all these conflicting situations, the Sudanese governmental player has already paralyzed key provisions of the CPA on the prerequisites of the Nation to promote the Sudanese personality and political well-being via cultural diversity and the constitutional citizenship.

A NEW ROUND-TABLE CONFERENCE

The Sudan needs a New Round-Table Conference: an all-Sudanese Constitutional Conference. Most likely, this kind of conferences will not take place at full scale unless the spirit of the October Uprising pulls up new nationalist leaderships to the forefront of the civil society movement, as it did in the 1960s.

Those would-be leaders might be able to gain confidence of the Sudanese popular support, in addition to the necessary regional and international support to go ahead forcing the national interests of Sudan in the next elections, inasmuch as the NIF/NCP arsenal of repression would be effectively removed.

* The author is a sociologist at the Department of Social Work & Sociology in Tennessee State University, Nashville TN, USA. He can be reached at [email protected]