Darfur: Ceasefire agreement with those who do not have the fire!

By Mahmoud A. Suleiman

March 21, 2010 — The government of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) officials signed a ‘ceasefire’ accord with the newly formed body, the Liberation and Justice Movement (LJM), which includes several small factions in the Qatari capital Doha weeks after Khartoum signed a similar agreement with the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) rebel group in Darfur. Analysts believe that this alliance which has been precipitously created is doomed to collapse given the conflicts within its components. Furthermore, the president for the group, Dr. El-Tegani Seisei who was brought hastily from Addis Ababa and inaugurated just prior to the announcement of signing of the alleged cease-fire agreement is still a staff of the United Nations (UN), the position discounted against the share of the Government of Sudan and to make the situation complex Dr. El-Tegani Seisei has been reported allegedly as the potential candidate of the Umma Party al-Sadiq al Mahdi wing in the elections which will be held in April 2010. People know for fact that the National Conciliation or the “National Consensual “Compromise” Agreement signed by the Umma Party leader Al-Sadiq Al-Mahdi with the National Congress (NCP) remains viable. Not long ago, Dr. El-Tegani Seisei was a member of the Darfuri Civil Society Organisation who came from Sudan and attended the workshop and the Conference convened in Doha in November 2009. The sudden appearance Dr. El-Tegani Seisei as a leader of a Darfuri rebel movement is considered largely due to the tireless role played by his sponsor, the retired General U.S. presidential envoy Scott Gration who was searching for an alternative person from the Fur ethnic group to replace Mr. Abdel Wahid Mohamed el-Nur the historic leader and founder of the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM/A) who is based Dr. El-Tegani Seisei in Paris and refuses to participate in the efforts to bring peace in the War-Stricken Darfur region. Dr. El-Tegani Seisei represents the Trojan horse for Mr. Gration although it is doubtful this would decisively end the seven-year war and bring lasting just peace for the people of Sudan in Darfur. Nevertheless, the revolutionary uprise of the people of Sudan in Darfur was born to live on until it restores the rights to the owners from the unjust ruler whose with hands are stained with the blood of the martyrs and to see justice has taken its course and to do justice to the oppressed through the implementation of the arrest warrants against those who have been indicted and remain fugitives in the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands.

It has been widely recognised that the National Congress to resort to ‘divide and rule’ strategy which it managed to practice it strictly in the cause of the people of Sudan in Darfur and succeeded to penetrate the social fabric of Darfur, which led to the fragmentation of all the armed movements to create splinter so-called movements. NCP made phantom internet political bodies which eventually and basically becoming part of the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS), one of the arms to deter the opponents of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP).

The National Congress Party regime needs to understand that Revolution of the people of Sudan in Darfur broke out to live up to restore the legitimate rights in full and those sacred rights would not be replaced by some functionless marginal jobs granted to some individual whose objectives were to scramble to grab those derisory positions to become subservient to the elements of the Government of the NCP, and bury the people’s revolution for which thousands of innocent lives were lost, hundreds of villages were destroyed and all the Darfuri communities have became internally displaced citizens living in makeshift camps and refugees living across the borders of Sudan in eastern Chad and Central Africa Republic in similar camps and in the Diaspora, seven hard years on.

Analysts assertively say that the objectives of the U.S. envoy to Sudan General Scott for this hasty unleavened work includes, among others, scoring of some political points before it is too late as a face-saving maneuver for the numerous failures of his mission, and as well as to allow for the upcoming elections to proceed without delay in order to meet the fixed date of January 2011 of the referendum, during the people of southern Sudan are likely to choose the option of succession (separation). Therefore, Mr. Scott did not hide his hostility towards Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) which is the armed movement found in the ground in Darfur all the time, advocating for the rights of its people, fighting the NCP military might in defence of the civilians and not subject to the orders of Mr. Scott Gration. He, therefore, tried to bring into existence someone to do all work he wanted to be accomplished as his mission is getting impossible by every minute and every moment and time is not in its favour. Not surprising, he is in a race against the lost time!

Observers say it is ironic that the GoS signed a ceasefire agreement with a group of individuals who have no military presence on the ground in Darfur, or in any other place in Sudan! Furthermore, analysts and experts who know Darfur conflict inside out wonder as to whether Dr. El-Tegani Seisei will be prepared to wear the Guerrilla warfare uniform and reside in the Darfur desert or the Jebel Marra mountain terrain, the traditional heartland of the Fur, with the troops, planning and implementing small-scale raids, ambushes and attacks against government soldiers which enjoy air cover of helicopter gunships, Mig 21 bombers and Antonov carriers. The task also involves focusing around the use of a small, mobile force. This they think it unlikely as Dr. El-Tegani Seisei had been given the promise that he would be in the Republican Palace in Khartoum in the post of Deputy President of the Republic of Sudan and therefore he does not need to incur the hardship of going to the field of war and face the enemy (The Government of Sudan Army) which is part of the government he will be presiding. Moreover, Dr. El-Tegani Seisei essentially does not belong to a faction that carries arms and stays in the field of war in Darfur. Some political satirists would say that Dr. El-Tegani Seisei is to a certain extent the Karzai of Darfur, but he would become a miniature and locked up within the confines of Palais des Gordon as it happened to the first assistant to the President of the Republic of Sudan, Prisoner of Palace of Gordon Mr. Minni Arku Minnawi the signatory of the infamous and the notorious Abuja agreement, the so-called Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA) through which the people of Sudan in Darfur missed opportunities for peace and lost their livelihood in the Darfur region and at a very high cost.

While the relentless efforts of H.E. Djibril Bassolé, AU/UN Joint Chief Mediator and H.E. Ahmed Abdalla Aal Mahmoud, State Minister for Foreign Affairs, State of Qatar, for Darfur to resolve the armed conflict and achieve peace for the beleaguered people of Sudan in Darfur are highly valued, however, they can not be relieved from the blame that the mediation was indifferent to the chaos taking place in Doha Forum which provided an opportunity and made the doors wide open for everyone claiming to be armed movement and wants to sign a framework agreement for the cessation of hostilities! This behavior of the mediation has led to more delay and procrastination, and to further the suffering of the people of Sudan in Darfur who are waiting patiently to emergence of a long-waited peace from the Doha, Qatar Forum.

According to the official Sudan News Agency-SUNA, issued in Khartoum, Jan. 30, 2010 that the Chairman of the Mechanism of the Unification of Fur tribe and the People of Darfur, Salahaddin Mohamed Al-Fadul said that a comprehensive forum for the leaders of Fur was held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 25-27 January with an aim to lessen the suffering of the people of Darfur as a result from the conflict in the area. Furthermore, the news agency reported that the forum was attended by more than 40 leaders representing various areas and all political and intellectual spectra from inside and abroad. He explained that it discussed 12 specialized working papers addressing all aspects of the issue of Darfur, explaining that the meetings stressed the importance of realizing the social unity of the Fur tribe to shoulder the responsibility of realization of a just and lasting peace in Darfur. Al-Fadul further said the meeting called on the armed movements to discard violence and to form one vision regarding the requirements and realization of peace. Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports, Mohamed Yousif Abdullah, on his part, said the objective of the forum was the unification of the vision of Fur tribe with regard to the issue of Darfur and to enable the displaced to return to their home villages voluntarily, calling on the armed movements to refrain from the hidden agenda and to abdicate their personal gains and to put the problem of Darfur in the right track. Salih Mahmoud, a member of the Mechanism, said the participants in Addis Ababa meeting have managed to end their disagreements and are now devoted for the unity of Fur tribe as a vocal tribe in Darfur and urged the government to contribute effectively in reconstruction of the villages that are affected by the war in order to realize the voluntary repatriation. It is to be noted that the meeting has called for holding of an inclusive forum of Fur tribe in Tripoli in the coming period. It should be noted that the organisation, planning, financial funding and the provision of logistics for this event was carried out by the U.S. president’s special envoy to Sudan, General Scott Gration. The attempt of Mr. Gration T to approach the resolution of the crisis of the seven-year conflict in Darfur through the tribal lines is pathetic and unfortunate and it will lead to a an abject failure and more fragmentation and infighting. He needs to know that there are more than hundred tribal groups in the region of greater Darfur and the Fur people are part of that. Nobody denies the considerably large size of the Fur tribal ethnic group among those who continue suffering in the internally displaced camps and those in the refugee camping grounds and in the Diaspora.

Many of those interested in and/or affected by the issue of Darfur wonder about whether there is any avenue or a way to have access to an equation that would contribute in ameliorating this tense situation nearing a crisis and rescue the peace prospects for the Darfur issue which seems to be heading to be blown away by the storms of differences and fragmentation with the resultant fate of a return to square one of the war that has destroyed the green and the dry in the Darfur region.

As the saying goes, a difference of opinion does not invalidate the affection and that there are no two people differ on the legality of the issue of the people of Sudan in Darfur, it is pertinent that concessions from all sides to be made to reach a consensus vision through integrated or a coordinated unity to overcome this dilemma and deadlock into which the talks have ended. The parties of the people of Darfur to know, and this is obvious, that the ruling National Congress Party (NIF/NCP) is the only beneficiary of this tense situation. It is time to make the Government of National Congress to miss the opportunity of exploiting this situation to achieve its usual evil objectives against the people of Sudan in Darfur. I wonder whether the Darfurian parties and factional groups will listen and heed to the voice of reason and leave the narrow self-gains for the major issue that made revolution broke out in the year two thousand and three AD in Darfur? This is a sixty-four dollars question (US$64) in the waiting to be answered!

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]