The issue of atonement of the Sudanese Communist Party

By Mahmoud A. Suleiman

September 6, 2009 — The Sudanese public in the National Capital, Khartoum, followed in the newspapers the unfolding events and the growing phenomenon of excommunicating Muslims by a group calling itself ‘The Sudanese Association of Scholars and Preachers for Legitimacy/ Islamic Sharia’. This group, in Press Statement on 22nd August 2009, said that the members of the Sudanese Communist Party (SCP) of being Infidels even if they do the five pillars of Islam that include five prayers a day and fasting the month of Holy Ramadan. Furthermore, the group has been reported as saying that any marriage between a Communist and a non Communist person is considered null and void. Many Sudanese consider this group as nothing else than a terrorist Association of fundamentalists who call for divisions among the Sudanese society by inciting sedition and terrorism. The group went further and issued a fatwa making the Communists as atheists and infidels (unbelievers in Islam).

The Association said that they had built their fatwa on the principles of the Communist Party, which says that religion and the idea of God a myth and that the Communist doctrine is atheistic belief held by the three communists (Marx, Lenin and Stalin), in the form of disbelief in God, religion and private property. The statement pointed out that the Communist Party has brought to humanity, only blood and death and fear and considered responsible for the death (100) million people in the world.

Following those inflammatory remarks, major Sudanese political forces in Sudan had condemned and distant themselves from the assertions of the group. However, the ruling party, the National Congress Party (NCP) headed by the ICC indicted fugitive Omer Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir kept silent! It is believed that the group might be one of the cells within the regime.

The leader of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) Dr. Khalil Ibrahim was quoted by the Sudanese Newspaper (Ajras al-Hurriya) as saying that the members of Sudanese Communist Party are Muslims Sudanese citizens and he rejects the trend that calling them infidels, calling a Muslim an infidel is not a simple act. He also was quoted as saying he does not think there are communists in the sense reported by the body calling itself “Association of Scholars and Preachers of Islamic Sharia”. Dr. Khalil blamed the Government of Sudan (GoS) for allowing these extremist groups to flourish and defame innocent citizens to damage their reputation prior to the general elections planned for the next year. Moreover, it is interference in political freedom of the (SCP) as a legitimate party. Labeling opponents as infidels is a dangerous political agenda and is considered an act of blatant terrorism.

Dr. Khalil stated at the end of his telephone communiqué with the journalist of (Ajras al-Hurriya): “We in the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) reject this trend; this phenomenon will create discord between the citizens and increase tensions. This behavior did not exist in the Sudan before. The hidden agenda of seeking to muzzle the other from freedom of expression is deplorable and I reject it completely. And God the Almighty said in the Holy Qur’an in Sura Al-Kahf, Aya 29: “ The Truth is From your Lord; Let him who will Believe, and let him Who will reject ‘it’ : For the wrong-doers, We have prepared a Fire” and in Sura Al-Kafirun, Aya 6 Almighty Allah said: “To you be your way, And to me mine”. The meaning is that for the willing, let him believe, and of the unwilling, let him disbelieve, and that you have your religion and a I have mine (my religion); then why should we want to control the orientations of the other people. I think this is an intellectual terrorism against others, and it is time to stop it.”

Earlier, Lubna Ahmed Hussein was among 13 Sudanese women arrested on July 3rd 2009 in a raid by members of the public order police (POP) force on a popular Khartoum cafe for wearing trousers (pants), considered indecent by the strict interpretation of Islamic law (Article 151) adopted by the National Congress Party (NCP) government of Sudan. All but three of the women were flogged at a police station two days later and fined 250 Sudanese pounds, or about $120. It was alleged that some of women subjected to flogging in the past were non-Muslims. Ms Hussein and two other women decided they wanted to go on trial and Lubna Hussein invited human rights workers, western diplomats and fellow journalists to Wednesday’, July 29, 2009 hearing. Some of her women friends showed up in court wearing trousers in a show of support. However, .Judge Mudathir Rashid adjourned the hearing until August the 4th 2009 to give Hussein time to quit her job with the media department of the U.N. Mission in Sudan. If convicted, she stands to suffer 40 lashes by a leather whip. It was learned that the Sudanese stopped Ms. Hussein from traveling abroad at the invitation of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Therefore, she waits for the date for her trial in this month of Ramadan.

What we see today in the Sudanese politics is exactly or even worse than what it was
Yesterday; yesterday being the 1960s! It seems that as if history is repeating itself. In 1965, the Islamic Charter Front (ICF), the seed that led to the NIF led by Dr. Hassan Abdalla al-Turabi, spearheaded agitation which forced the parliament in Sudan to ban the Communist Party and expel its MPs after anti-Islamic remarks attributed to a Communist student. The Islamic Charter Front (ICF) threatened to wage an unrelenting jihad against the “atheists and infidels” and campaigned for popular rallies in the three town capital, Khartoum, putting pressure on the Parliament and on the weak Umma Party and the National United Party (Umma-NUP) coalition government set up after the April 1965 elections.

That step contributed into the left-leaning May 25th 1969 coup d’état that brought Jaafer Nimeiri into power, a decisively anti-Islamist force and a pro-Communist regimes.
The Islamic Charter Front threatened to wage an unrelenting jihad against the “atheist and infidel” and campaigned for popular rallies in the three town capital Khartoum putting pressure on the Parliament and on the weak Umma Party and the National United Party (Umma-NUP) coalition government set up after the April 1965 elections.

People ask with amazement the phenomenon and the reasons behind the strict adherence of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) in Sudan, to apply selectively certain Sharia legal provision in absolute isolation, picky way, from the essence of Islamic principles such as justice and equality, ensuring the care of widows and orphans, fighting poverty, providing basic services for the needy and taking into account the sanctity of human lives and not to abuse public money under their honesty. The long awaited answer comes from political analysts, experts in the region and keen observers; the application of those legal provisions provide for elements of the ruling NCP regime protection and immunity from accountability and without exposure to retaliation. What is more, they interpret the religious texts in their favour on the grounds that they were guardians of the Nation and should be obeyed by the public by virtue of the Sharia law and their status in a religious state. It is said that this group’s behavior, as akin to the acts of priests in the Dark Ages in Europe period of decline experienced in Western Europe after the fall of Rome Empire.

Observers say that they were expected the State to make the effort and the interest in matters of real and basic daily concerns of the Sudanese citizens who have been continuously longing for the State to provide free educational opportunities for children, free treatment available for the sick and daily food rations for the hungry, and establishing security for all and stopping the unnecessary wars raging all over the country in the form of the State against its own citizens. Wise elders of Sudan put a question and cross-examine the head of the regime: Why do not you leave, Omar Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir, before you are forcibly repatriated to the ICC?

It is time for this group, the NCP, which had controlled Sudan with an iron fist for the past two decades and abjectly failed to run the country through good Governance, rule of law and basic human rights and personal freedom for the public to quit. It is ironic that the regime that claimed to be the savior of the Sudan from division and decay is today failing to protect the National Capital Khartoum of floods caused by mere rain fall water! So it would be a wise decision if the regime gives up power and declare their inability to continue ruling Sudan. Will they dare to do that? That is the Sixty Four Dollars (US$64 question) that awaits an answer!

Dr. Mahmoud A. Suleiman is the Deputy Chairman of the General Congress for Justice and Equality Movement (JEM). He can be reached at [email protected].