The non-protections usurping Sudan national elections (2010)
By Mahgoub El-Tigani
May 15, 2010 – In 2007, this writer noted under the same heading that “the Sudan ruling junta is unequivocally determined to rule without competition; irrespective of clear provisions in the Interim Constitution obligating the two ruling partners of the country, the Government of Sudan (GoS) and the Government of South Sudan (GSS), to ensure the largest participation possible for all political parties and civil society groups in the transition to democratic rule by the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA)” (Sudan Tribune: November 2, 2007).
The 2010 elections revealed further evidence on the NCP determination to “rule without competition,” despite the fact that almost three years lapsed since postponing of the elections in 2007 to allow the competing parties to prepare for the contest. Notwithstanding, the CPA/Interim Constitution clear provisions “to ensure the largest participation possible for all political parties and civil society groups in the transition to democratic rule” were ruthlessly violated by the repressive regime.
THE 2010 ELECTIONS
Formally speaking, the Sudan National Elections’ Commission (NEC) led by the respectable judge Abel Alier and his assistant professor Abd-Allah Ali Abd-Allah has done its best to assure possible voting for all eligible citizens throughout the electoral process. Equally importantly, the NEC was not able to satisfy by international standards the full rights of both candidates and voters to enjoy equalitarian opportunities in the exercise. The opposition’s criticisms of the NEC performance, however, were largely related to the NCP abuses of government resources to rig up the elections.
Such abuses and other violations were elaborately discussed in our earlier analysis of the non-protections of national elections which will be further analyzed in this study. The opposition’s blame on the NEC for the elections’ fraud, nonetheless, should have concentrated in the first place on the National Congress Party (NCP) non-compliance with the democratic process more than the opposition’s fierce attack on the NEC. Still today, both opposition and government are required to agree on a national solution to the escalated political crisis in the country.
Admittedly, the NEC announced the occurrence of persistent difficulties in the technicalities of voting due to the novelty of the event for millions of the country’s new generations that never experienced democratic elections since the Brotherhood’s military coup on June 30th, 1989; the multi-faceted complexities of the electoral process; and the inevitable need to repeat voting in many constituencies. The NEC investigated several instances of election violation of which a great many allegations were not timely investigated. The Carter Center and the European Union were the first to note shortcomings of the elections. Strangely, several African and Arab sources believed that the elections “were quite acceptable” by African and Arab standards.
Aiming to win approximately 10 million potential voters that registered their names to decide on the future governance of the country versus 6 million supporting the NCP president, the opposition forces hammered on the NEC’s administrative shortcomings by legal and political disputes. But the relative success of the opposition to shake the grounds of trust against the NCP was seriously offset by the opposition’s failure to line up the registered pool of anti-NCP forces to manifest their will power by accomplishing campaigns, albeit with meager financial resources. Divided among its forces, the opposition failed to unify these potentialities by a national program of action behind one candidate to defeat the 20-years’ single-party dictatorship.
PREDICTABLE OUTCOMES
In 2007, we predicted the NIF/NCP extended seizure of political power by false elections: “Supported by the coercive monopoly of State powers and the repressive apparatuses of the PDF and the Janjaweed gangsters, the huge amounts of monies the regime has been accumulating for its own beneficiaries, political allies, private firms, and other partisan favors, irrespective of any lawful avenue of expenditure, will provide a massive source for the ruling junta to secure overriding victory in the next elections. Thus excepting its circles from public investigations, the NIF/NCP majority legislator will restrict the contesting parties from financial sources by the Act for National Elections (under way), additional censorial sanctions on party resources, travel spending, emigrant remittances, and the kindred.”
In actual fact, the 2010 electoral campaigns witnessed the NCP largest expenditures by state funds. Presidential candidate Bashir roamed the million miles country with free hand abuses of government equipment and financial resources. The government-appointed governors followed suit, and members of the armed forces, police, and PDF militias exhibited pro-government voting in their workplaces, in addition to thousands of the election locations, with unprecedented intimidation to the civilian voters or their competing parties.
The NIF/NCP ruling regime has been enjoying uninterrupted State monopolies since the June 30th military coup in the year 1989 up to this day with additional privileges as the sole recipient of unknown revenues from oil. Besides unaccountable investment by the ruling party’s businesses with China, Iran, Gulf States, Malaysia, Singapore, Pakistan, and India, in addition to unknown Brotherhood’s international collaterals, many of these multi-billion deals involved lucrative commissions on costly arms’ sales with China and Russia.
Led by the Minister of Defense and other NIF/NCP commanders of the armed forces, police and state security, unidentifiable amounts of money have been largely wasted as well as expensive recruitment and training programs for tens of thousands of the PDF troops and the Janjaweed militias. Similar amounts of spending have been wasted in the security operations of the ruling junta, as well as demagogic projects of which the earlier Turabi-led Arab Islamic People’s Conference depleted the public treasury to cover the costly propaganda of the Islamic Revolution.
The only time the GoS bodies were asked to account for some of this extravagant spending came about in storming memos forwarded by the GSS, inquiries by the NDA representatives in the pre-elections National Council [the GoS parliament], and a critical statement condemning the GoS silence about the expenditures of these public monies by the Umma leader Sadiq al-Mahdi some time ago.
In the pre-elections period, the “Islamist regime and its Brothers leaderships never answered any of these legitimate queries, which is a clear evidence of the corrupted nature of the regime and its un-constitutional abstention to account for the waste it has been doing on the national wealth of Sudan all these years. Dangerously enough, the opposition accused the NIF/NCP of hiding amounts of lethal weaponry in clandestine areas in different parts of the country, including the National Capital Khartoum, under tight control of the ruling party, away from regular official reporting. Most likely than not, the post-election parliament will not show a different picture.
As Farouq Abu Eissa put it, “Six or seven parliamentarians of the National Democratic Alliance converted the national assembly to an instrument of democratic confrontations which publicized the government’s corruption and abrupt budgets. The parliament turned into foci of struggles between democrats and the government. Annoyed by all this, the government rigged up the elections to create a closed parliament in the face of democracy. The 2010 elected parliament would be a lifeless dormant institution. But the People of Sudan and the living forces of the people will establish other areas to challenge the ruling regime for the sake of the democratic transition and the rule of law.”
THE OPPOSITION’S CRITIQUE
The unlawful performance of the NCP helped to siphon off the opposition frustrations: The DUP guide Mohamed Osman al-Mirghani did not vote as a sign of protest and the DUP presidential candidate Hatim El-Sir announced, “The voters are prepared to express their anger at the election’s fraud in massive demonstrations in the streets.”
The PPC chief, Hassan al-Turabi, rejected the election results as “rigged up, according to confessions by NCP top officials.” The SPLM secretary general Pagan Amum and the SPLM presidential candidate Yasir Arman, together with presidential candidate Lam Akol and the South Sudan Democratic Forum spokesperson Bona Malwal affirmed irrevocable rejection of the results. The Umma leading politicians Sara Nugd-Allah and Mariam al-Mansora chided both the NCP and the NEC for “partisan acts that falsified the elections.”
Journalist ‘Afaf Abu Kashawa (al-Midan: April 26, 2010) noted that the treacherous NCP victory “was recklessly received by the masses: The vote count and rates indicated that the presidential winning candidate received only 6.9% of the 40 millions total population of Sudan, which meant he represented 17.5% of the population, 35% of eligible voters, and 43% of the registered voters. A million votes were cancelled by the election committees. Five million registered individuals did not vote. Nafi’ announced that the NCP membership included about 5 million persons. But the total votes that supported the NCP were less than 2 million votes”.
Crossing election contours with varying degrees of political leverage by more than 7 presidential candidates that hardly agreed on a well-detailed democratic program versus the NCP state media-monopolized vote, the opposition’s fragmented efforts ensued in a climate of confusion that, in turn, added to the effective monopolies of the ruling NCP. Still, the opposition forces failed to unify behind a powerful candidate that might have defeated the NCP ruling system by workable agenda, political expertise, and international credibility.
Bravely, Farouq Abu Eissa, spokesperson of the Juba Conference National Forces, (which included the Umma, DUP, CP, SPLM, and many other parties and trades unions) criticized the opposition’s grave mistakes in the electoral process: “The parties were rather confused before the masses, as some boycotted, some participated, and some changed position repeatedly which reduced the opposition’s image in the eyes of people. These political forces are qualified to pass over the transition. But they have to criticize themselves openly to the satisfaction of people. Their agenda must be transparently based on the popular claims and aspirations.”
A PRESIDENTIAL TESTIMONY
May the 3rd, 2010, Sadiq al-Mahdi, a chief presidential candidate – judged by rich experience in state management, lifelong political career, and entrenched leadership of the Umma major party – spoke to the Foreign Press Association (FPA) in Cairo about the elections and the post elections situation: “The elections were conducted in unhealthy environment. The opposition parties required the NEC by an official memorandum on March 4, 2010, to postpone elections until November 2010 to be able to settle the North-South disputes on the population census and the borders issue, among other problems, and to focus closely upon peace in Darfur to enable the Darfuris to participate in the elections, provided that all restrictive laws must be abrogated to allow free elections.”
Mahdi affirmed further that “on March the 18th, 11 out of 12 presidential candidates submitted a memorandum to the Presidency criticizing partisanship of the NEC and asking for unbiased revision of its legal, administrative, and financial matters. The parties’ memo and the candidates’ memo were both rejected. The elections process was violated in more than 10 sections of the Elections’ Act.”
“The violations included registration of disciplinary forces in the workplace, not at their residence (section 22-2); unfair media access to the competing parties (66); non-financial support (67-2-g); non-restrictions on the expenditure of candidates or parties (67-3) until by March 31, 2010, when the NCP candidates exhausted over-expenditures via abuses of the state apparatuses and resources in their election campaigns (69).” Moreover, the NEC “violated section 87 which prohibited corruption by party donations or services in election campaigns; and violated section 65-3 which illegalized the use of insulting language to generate hostilities in elections.”
“Soon after the registration was done, multiple shortcomings came about with the creation of a different register from the one earlier delivered to the parties. Added to this, party delegates were prevented from guarding the ballot box 24 hours a day. The boxes were replaced by night; votes were taken in the name of dead people; and the marker ink was easily removed. In response to these violations, all political parties boycotted the elections, except for the NCP, and announced rejection of the outcome in different stages: Some boycotted since March 31st; the Umma boycotted on April 9th, and the DUP and the PPC rejected the election process two days later.”
INTERNATIONAL OBSERVERS
Sadiq mentioned that “the elections’ international observers arrived in large numbers; and yet none of them dared calling the elections free or honest. Many proved the elections did not measure up to the international standards of freedom; non-abuse of authority; and provision of fair competition. The international observers must therefore answer this question: Was all these conditions met? The position of many international observers was not serious as they said, related to Mr. Scott Gration, that the elections were rigged up; but we accept the election results to move into the referendum of self-determination.”
“These false elections will create a polluted environment for the referendum. The observers who conducted serious and objective reporting included about 200 independent civil society organizations with 3,500 observers who agreed on the falseness of the elections and called on its abrogation. The figures published by the NEC proved the acts of rigging: Mr Omer Hassan Ahmed al-Bashir won 68% of approximately 10 million voters. The relative reduction of this proportion from the Mid-East known rates was due to the impact of his votes in the South which made only 13% in the states of the South, the Blue Nile, and South Kordofan. If the 10 states of the South, which were not controlled by the NCP, had been excluded from the count together with the two mentioned states, the figures that the NCP obtained would have amounted to almost 90% – a clear evidence of a fraud.”
“The political scene in Sudan after the occurrence of these rigged elections showed the NCP complete control over the North, as well as the SPLM control over the South whereas they both accused one another of dishonesty. The outcome was that the elections widened the gap in the national body as follows: The registered voters were 16 millions. The ones who voted were 10 millions of whose 6.9 voted for Bashir and 2.5 voted for other candidates. If we added the percentage of the latter’s to the absentee voters it would be 49% versus the 44% that voted for Bashir.”
The Umma leader concluded in this statement: “The NCP was the one that seized the authority and pushed the South with inappropriate policies to choose self-determination. Solely blamed for this historical responsibility, the NCP would continue to push the South to aggressive separation. All the Darfuri armed groups, including the Arko-Minawi Sudan Liberation Movement and Army, rejected the election results because they never participated in it, in addition to other shortcomings noted by their own assessment.”
THE BITTERNESS OF NATIONAL FORCES
Interviewed by al-Midan (April 29, 2010), Farouq Abu Eissa, the prominent National Forces’ spokesperson, described a statement implying acceptance of the Sudan election’s fraud by the Obama policy adviser on Sudan, the retired U.S.A Air Force Major-General Jonathan Scott Gration on the Sudanese elections as “a perfect failure for the American administration, especially because the U.S. considered itself the first defender of democracy, human rights, and the observable rules of free elections.”
The NF spokesperson accused the United States of “using double standards by accepting the elections fraud, wherein the international norms of acceptable elections are the one and the same human rights norms. The Envoy’s hurried announcement, ‘We were silent about it (the elections’ fraud) to get to the separation of the South’ turned to great publicity to the Americans’ open approval of separation,” lamented Eissa. “Had we had a respectable government, we wouldn’t have allowed him to move around us the way he did. I haven’t heard a single state official protesting his partisan stands that aimed to get to the referendum, only for separation of the South.”
The National Forces spokesperson reaffirmed his belief “in the People of Sudan who must have taken notice of this new American anti-democratic policy in the Third World Countries. The Sudanese will support who ever maintains their interests. We were expecting from Obama administration a different approach, namely that President Obama would handle issues with us and with the Third World Countries of which he is a descendant; that he would stand by the side of democracy and human rights.” Strongly disapproving the Envoy’s emphasis on separation, Abu Eissa said “the Sudanese are aware of the elections’ fraud, and are not in need of his announcements.”
“Separation is not in the interest of the South; nor is it in the interest of the North, or the interest of Africa as a whole. We support the right to self-determination to enable the southerners to exercise this right without obstacles by law, fraud, or some other hindrance. Transparent as we were, we still are unionists against separation and against the United States and its allies that support the South separation. If the South went away by separation, Africa would be exploited. Separation would cause great damage to the Sudan and to the vast majority of the African states that have the same Christian-Muslim dichotomy, or even ethnic divisions. If the South separation would go well by Western support, the West that supported the separation initiative would be blamed for it.”
Strongly condemning the Brotherhood’s aggressive governance against the interests of Sudan, the former Arab Lawyers Union Secretary General questioned the Arab support of Sudan to achieve the unity option: “The NCP government in the North did all it could do to make of separation an attractive option. The NCP government has been exercising policies to separate the South; and the government was supported by some elements in one or another Arab country. All this would add to the blame our people placed on the Arabs’ non-concern for the national agenda of Sudan… What position the Arabs have? And what position the Africans have? What have they done to help the Sudanese to achieve the attractive unity?”
“The European groups that came to monitor the elections supported by hypocritical words the Envoy’s assured adoption of separation. The European’s standpoint was strange because they handled human rights with double standards. Whatever Israel did against the Palestinians, Europeans were always supportive of Israel. We have experienced for the first time this Western bias since the West had been previously supportive of the forces that called on the respect of the human rights antagonized by the government’s authoritarianism.”
Farouq concluded in the fact that “the West now is clearly motivated by its own goals… The West will not recognize al-Bashir’s presidency. Bashir is considered antagonistic to the people and to democracy; a daily violator of human rights who is internationally accused before the ICC. But the West is opportunistically dealing with Bashir to get to the South referendum.”
THE SEPEARATION ISSUE
Apart from the political, bureaucratic, ethno-tribal, regional, and geopolitical challenges surrounding the GSS, the vitality of elections is not simply related to a regular power striving or some traditional competition between contesting groups for legislative seats or executive posts of a ruling system. The elections will make it possible for the Sudanese People of the South to decide their political fate (staying with the North as a unified country, or separating from the North as an independent state) for the first time in the modern history of Sudan.
This goal-achievement of the CPA was certainly the single most important provision the GoS accepted painstakingly in the Naivasha negotiations. The heavy toll of keeping up the South “as a marginal part of the North,” not “as an autonomous part within the unified Sudan,” has been a major motive for the succeeding governments of Sudan to commit the brutalities of civil war that ravaged the Nation for long destructive decades (1955-1972; 1983-2005).
The GoS insistence to overpower offensive commitments by the earlier central governments of Sudan to maintain the South “as a marginal part of the North” was evidently persistent in the offensive by the GoS president against Abyei committee and the CPA, as well as the condescending blame by Taha and his presidential executives on the GSS for its legitimate endeavors to exercise autonomous rule, or to pursue constitutional rights to accomplish regional or national goals (especially the South security and the Darfur peace).
Throughout the elections, the NCP acted with a separatist attitude offending all nationalists and indirectly threatening to weaken the Nation’s striving to establish a democratic unified state. Accusing the NCP of “illegal acts to destabilize tranquility of the South,” the southerners’ national presidential candidate Arman announced repeatedly that “the NCP was not interested in the country’s national unity.” A lifelong disciple of the Sudanese great unionist John Garang de Mabior, Yasir stressed the SPLM belief in the national unity of Sudan.
“The NCP was happy with the results, although all the other parties rejected them. Voting in the South proved to be an acute polarization and a clear stand against the NCP. If the NCP continues to control the North, the ultimate outcome would be separation of the South. There are elements supportive of the NCP such as the Fair Peace Forum which spread about hostilities against southerners that possibly would make of the separation an aggressive experience,” assessed al-Mahdi.
From his part, the National Forces’ spokesperson affirmed: “We shall not rely on the West any more. We should very actively depend on our People in the North and in the South by agreeing above all on a new renaissance based on a positive understanding of the relationship between religion and politics such that the southerners would never be converted to second class citizens. The Sudanese have already prepared a charter through the resolutions of Asmara and the Nairobi Declaration with the participation of the late John Granag. The charter stated the need to handle fairly the issues of authority and wealth since the Naivasha oil deal offered only 50% to the South, although the South produced 80% of the total production.”
It is extremely important to understand southerner views as “secession of South Sudan looms in the horizon,” in the words of Steve Paterno (Sudan Tribune: May 9, 2010) that clearly indicate a different standpoint from those earlier discussed. Here, Paterno explained: “To Envoy Gration, the conduct of Sudan’s elections was necessary, not so much that it would be free and fair, but it was necessary as a process of getting to the last stage of the CPA which will define the future of Sudan… In all likelihood, Envoy Gration predicts the secession of South Sudan. His challenge and task is to make the secession as smoothly as possible, without both the North and South return to another cycle of war. Even more challenging for Envoy Gration is the sustainability of South Sudan as an impoverished and newly emerging nation – a region devastated by decades of wars and without basic infrastructure, institutions, and capacity.”
One might ask: What abilities for an independent State or strategic alternatives the South sufficiently has to separate from the North? Paterno anticipated auspicious emergence and growth of an independent South Sudan nation and state. Undoubtedly, there were stern difficulties with respect to the occurrence of “violence with unimaginable proportion,” besides the free-hand looting and killing by the foreign Ugandan-based LRA, and “provocative devastating attacks by the Khartoum armed forces against South Sudan.” But the GSS would certainly take advantage of General Gration’s planned “Juba Surge” that in the final analysis might mobilize deserved international attention to stabilize the South, contain the Khartoum armed forces, and reduce ethnic conflicts by GSS law enforcement capabilities.
Steve Paterno’s optimistic expectation of a peaceful establishment of a separate South has been narrowly shared in the 2010 elections by democratic northern leaders who insisted, a free referendum would take place properly only under the auspices of a national democratic government. For these, the experience of the 2010 elections ascertained the continuous governance of the country by the NCP deceptive rule would only end up with more violence in the pre-or-the post referendum era. The Imam of the Ansar and Umma party highlighted this possibility in the following statement: “The unwise ones who gave a blind eye to the need to have honest elections only to concentrate on the upcoming referendum will discover that the rigged up elections will increase the difficulties of conducting a free referendum.”
PERSISTENT HOSTILITIES
For sure, the 40 million people of Sudan deserve the greatest popular sharing in national decision making than the spiral conflicts thus far attained between the two CPA hostile partners. The failures of the NCP/SPLM parties to achieve the national objectives of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement sent an alarming message to the political forces of Sudan, as well as the regional and the international powers concerned with peace and development of the country, to consider ways to improve the treaty performance.
Both the NCP and the SPLM peace partners exhibited immense hostilities in the pre-and-post election rounds. All over the pre-elections times (2005-2010), the Sudanese political arena has been closely watching the GoS hostile performance vis-à-vis the GSS, which aimed to pre-empty the CPA significant agreement from the promising opportunities it brought about to end the North-South hostilities, especially the threats of war or any other war-inciting policies or practices in all regions of the country.
The accumulated failures of the NIF/NCP GoS to implement the CPA in any principled method, however, jeopardized the climates of peace, the power sharing, and democratization steps thus far established by the People of Sudan with tremendous support by the International Community, in general, and the United Nations, the African Union, and the US Government, in particular.
Neither the South nor any other region of the marginal Sudan, however, would possibly accomplish the targeted goals of socio-economic and political progression without full liberation from the center’s debilitating obstacles via a popular civil government in a unified State that should seriously implement just and fair center-region relations under a transparent system of democratic rule. The NIF-NCP elusive implementation of the CPA, intimidating militias in the South, media attacks, and unwillingness to share honest oil accounts with the GSS or the Northern opposition among other hostile policies act negatively against the South-North hopes for a successful transition to democratic rule.
As this writer noted about the non-protections of elections in 2007, the GoS aggressive hostilities against the CPA and the GSS were never abated up to a recent flat call by Bashir to the People’s Defense Forces (PDF) “to stand by in full armament for Abyei” in the light of “the GoS full rejection of recommendations by the Abyei Committee to settle the GoS/GSS dispute on the area.” The NIF/NCP GoS has been deliberately executing with all State powers and treasury a firm plan to rule out all possibilities of providing a fair and just competition in the elections. Nothing else occurred in the 2010 elections!
THE FATE OF PEACE
The national need to secure fair and just democratic elections to operate the country’s promised transition to a lasting democracy and permanent peace was evenly extremely difficult by the imbalance of political parties in the North, which most regrettably has been escalated by the wrongful allowance of political, legislative, judicial, and executive domination for the NIF war-mongering beast to control the transitional period in sum or in detail, according to the Naivasha negotiations and the CPA texts.
Unfortunately, the far-sighted warning and the conscious cautioning from the NIF tyranny by all Sudanese civil society groups and opposition parties, which overwhelmed the country and the external world against a NIF/NCP prolonged political control at the negotiations time and the aftermath, were negligently ignored by the IGAD and the IGAD Friends who emphasized a short-sighted peace arrangement at expense of a far-sighted All-Parties Strategy (as successfully experienced in Mali and South Africa) for the deeply-rooted multi-dimensional and complex crises of Sudan.
The assumption raised by the Naivasha think tanks (versus the Sudanese indigenous opposition) that an empowered NIF/NCP Brotherhood “would act legitimately for peace, instead of illegitimately pursuing wars” failed completely in the post-CPA period. The reason was that, the internationally-legitimized anti-democratic rule has been utilizing every drop of power to drown the country in financial corruption, military action, and security repression since day one of the CPA. In our opinion, however, the NIF/NCP monopolistic nature will never render it possible to mend up the CPA to include necessary amendments to ensure all-Sudanese sharing in the transitional period, even if the SPLM agrees to this necessity.
The China-led international negligence of the role that the indigenous opposition was most prepared to play to end the crises of its own nation in good faith with the CPA ailing partnership indicated the coercive expulsion of the Sudanese civil society and the effective political parties from all State affairs by the repressive regime which happily made maximum use of the situation for partisan gain. The final resultant of these serious imbalances was crystal clear: continuous failures in the North-South governmental relations; frustrated roles by the regional and international powers; and a most dangerous pre-emptying of the national competencies and political potentialities by both NIF rulers and external players.
More compelling than before, the need to ensure full participation of the Sudanese political parties and civil society groups in national decision making, as a sole alternative of the deteriorating state of affairs and the escalated crises between the two partners of the CPA, claims beyond any reasonable doubt serious attention with immediate actions in the national and the international arenas. The post-elections’ reactions are quite consistent with these views. Together with the DUP Mirghani, the presidential candidate al-Mahdi and his colleagues Hatim ElSir and Mohamed Ibrahim Nugud and the National Forces believed the Naivasha-based CPA would do better were it appropriately adjusted to address the state of affairs of the Nation.
“The NCP (best) option is to realize the facts about its position, go above the perilous results of the elections, and be prepared to conduct a fair political settlement with the political forces,” advised the Umma leader.
THE SPECIAL SOUTH
The “structure and power relations of the ruling elite in the South” was a determining domain in the political formula to democratizing Sudan. True, the Sudanese people shared many similarities in the social life, for example the emphasis on individual freedoms and the everlasting struggles to enjoy public rights. Within the North, the Central Sudan, often at expense of the other marginal regions, consolidated lots of its ethnic and social differentials into a unified culture of negotiable politics and competitive agency that (despite army intrusions and unlawful interruptions of civil rule) molded centuries of global experiences, irrigated agriculture and manufacturing skills, and obtained high expertise in modern planning, business administration, education, health, and the other modern services.
The half of a century war-trodden South has been severely deprived of modern skills and amenities. In spite of the high potentialities and abilities of the southerners in running an autonomous system of rule in the South, as well as sharing power and wealth on equitable terms with the central governance, significant differences existed between the South and the North with respect to the extent of State-society negotiation and reconciliation practices; trade unionism; levels of urbanization, economic infrastructures, and city construction; and the efficacy of the means and experiences of complex organizations.
Unique characteristics of the cultural life in the two parts of the country differentiated their religious preferences, social styles, and the modes of legal relations and political interactions. These facts were fully recognized by the CPA and the Interim Constitution, as well as the opposition groups; albeit consistently ignored by the NIF/NCP GoS political tutelage and ethno-regional prejudices. On the other side, the GSS was required to exert a great effort to repudiate the sizable segment of the Southerner democratic expatriates whose return, nonetheless, hinged on the prevalence of a stable ethno-regional peace in the South side-by-side with acceptable levels of non-military democratic governance.
The SPLM/A military machine played an active role against the NIF/NCP armies in civil war. The former finally inherited a devastated South whose population needed a sustainable civil-minded large-scale agricultural and manufacturing development for the millions displaced and the others impoverished and deprived of almost all modern amenities, especially jobs, housing, health, and education. The budget of the GSS, however, has not adequately addressed these agenda since 60 percent or more of the multi-million treasury went to the salaries and privileges of the military, security staff, and government personnel, exactly as the NIF/NCP GoS did in the North.
The Khartoum-Juba armed conflict in the Malakal massacre, the Yambio events a few years ago, and the most recent armed conflicts in Jonglei between SPLM troops and a number of southerner militias (March-May 2010) reflected in the serious burden of the South ruling group to maintain peace and sustainable development in the region. Most importantly, these regrettable conflicts unmasked the urgent need to democratize the ruling system of the whole country with equalitarian representation of the ethnic and social forces in the South, as well as the non-SPLM political parties and intellectual associations – the main sources of political stability towards the establishment of a modern polity in South Sudan.
The SPLM leadership has not yet shown effective efforts to work hand-in-hand with the democratic opposition of Sudan. Instead, precious time has been wasted in failing attempts to collaborate with the NIF/NCP discriminating group, which believed obviously in a Brotherhood supremacy over all non-Brotherhood groups (Muslim or non-Muslim; in Sudan or elsewhere), and was repeatedly prepared to engage the Nation in a new war or some military action to maintain emergency law, imposed the one-party rule. All this isolated the country from global and regional democracies and frustrated the civil society in all regions of the country.
During the 2010 elections, the potentialities of the South to establish secular rule, as enshrined in the CPA, were never strongly manifested in real democratic terms – above the militarized form of governance thus far in control. Accusing in press conferences the SPLM of rooting out competition at gunpoint all over the voting stations, both presidential candidate Lam Akol and presidential adviser Bona Malwal expressed strong rejection of the elections’ results in the South. This accusation portrayed the SPLM as another ruling party rigging up elections in the South, precisely as its northerner partner exercised in the North.
The SPLM opposition performance in the 2010 elections was not different from that of the northerner opposition: participating actively to support Yasir Arman in the presidential elections in the North, the SPLM withdrew its candidate all at a sudden with the shortest notice possible. This action confused the public as some northern partners did, followed by confusing announcements amongst the SPLM leadership, and exchanging media hostilities with the NCP about election fraud.
THE ERUPTED WAR IN DARFUR
Apparently, the crisis in Darfur lost momentum in the light of the NCP negligence of all possibilities to settle the problem by national wisdom and international consensus. The Doha Conference failed for the obvious reason that both the Qatari and the Sudanese governments ignored the collective nature of the crisis since they made the attempt to inflict piece-meal approaches to end the crisis, instead of granting equal vote for all civilian and armed players free of governments’ patronage – the only Sudanese option to end political crises.
The extended pressure thus far exerted on the NIF rulers to take appropriate measures to end the crisis in Darfur – beginning with full resettlement of the displaced natives in their misappropriated hakoras [agricultural homelands] with full compensation and decent conditions – has been cunningly ignored by the vigilant opportunism of the ruling junta. As strongly anticipated by the Sudanese opposition forces of which the Darfur own armed groups and civil society organizations condemned the NCP war-oriented policies and practices, the international and regional attention was steeply reduced besides the government-led national failures.
Practical recommendations to end the crisis were voiced by two Darfuri Diaspora meetings with the United States Institute of Peace (2008 and 2010) to no avail. Save for the USIP sponsored meetings in Washington D.C. to accommodate larger Darfuri representation in an initiative to help resolving the crisis, the regional and the international powers moved away from democratic representation to primitive inflictions of state-piece-meal negotiations. As a consequence of this, added to the elections’ fraud, war has already come into play in violent battles in Darfur between the government troops and the JEM forces. This renewed warfare ensued in severe casualties on both sides, the total collapse of Doha peace negotiations, and unrestricted media hostilities.
Abu Eissa affirmed previously that “Darfur claims are concise: Darfur must be recognized as one regional unit with a Darfuri elected representative to share with the other foreseeable 6 regional units of Sudan (the national capital and the northern, eastern, central, Kordofan, and South regions) in a parliamentary Head of State Council. Darfur must obtain fair share of authority, according to the population size. Full accountability for all crimes committed against humanity committed in Darfur is strictly required. Excluding the NCP, all political parties were agreed on these claims.”
U.S. POLICY ON DEVELOPING STATES
The opposition’s critique over the Envoy’s approach to the issue of separation vis-à-vis unionist sentiments of the nationalist Sudanese, which made it possible to assume the general’s support of separatist tendencies, was not unvoiced by many American scholars that criticized the U.S. support of non-democratic systems for the sake of short-term strategies at the expense of lucrative U.S. far-sighted foreign policies.
In a recently published volume on Clashing Views in American Foreign Policy (edited by Andrew Bennett and George Shambaugh, 4th edition, 2008), Joseph Siegle noted that in the past few decades “some 87 previously nondemocratic countries have made discernible advances towards democracy. 70 have per capita incomes below US$4,000, making this a largely developing country phenomenon. Why some democratizers do so much better than others in their development effort?”
Siegle emphasized “the extent to which democratizers have established institutional mechanisms of shared power, or what I refer to as accountability institutions. These include checks on the chief executive (for example, a legislature that can initiate legislation and block egregious policies pursued by the executive branch), the separation of political party influence from state structures (evidenced by a merit-based civil service), the separation of economic opportunity from political authority as seen through an autonomous private sector, an independent judiciary, and a free press” (42-43).
“The classic litmus-test-holding multi-party elections-is increasingly unsatisfactory. With the evolving international norm of according legitimacy only to those leaders that have been democratically elected, heads of authoritative states have craftily attempted to co-opt the language and trappings of democracy so as to make the grade without ever seriously intending to share power” (45).
Siegle then criticized the pseudo-democratizer states or heads of states in which “Presidential elections are held… and opposition parties, a civil society, and a free press are ostensibly allowed. However, these democratic processes are heavily circumcised. Political opponents are frequently harassed, licenses of civil society organizations critical of the government are regularly rescinded, and strict self-censorship is imposed. Political power comfortably remains within the hands of (presidents).”
Tamara Cofman Wittes wrote in the same volume on “Arab Democracy, American Ambivalence”: “America can constrain the power of Arab autocrats and help create space for the emergence of liberal alternatives only by putting political pressure on the regimes and, at the same time, developing partnerships with indigenous reformers both in and out of government… To succeed, America must dovetail its assistance with the needs of Arab activists on the ground. This requires American officials to get outside their embassies and cultivate Arab allies. It also requires U.S. assistance programs to abandon familiar but ineffective approaches such as relying on international “trainers” and placing our funds at the service of governments with a different agenda.” (53)
At this point, let us ask with special reference to the ongoing efforts by General Scott Gration to end the crisis in Darfur: Has the American administration worked fairly enough with the Sudanese democratic opposition, compared to its continuous concerns with the NCP and the SPLM governments? The Envoy’s pledge to help Darfur and to prepare Sudan for a better stage of negotiations has been received with appreciation and respect. His meetings with Darfurians in and outside Sudan as well as many other Sudanese are extremely important. Meetings with the external experts who know on both scholarly and personal grounds the Sudanese and their national concerns thoroughly well, for example the US-based Sudanese Studies Association, etc., are advisable.
The necessary way, however, to end the genocide, enforce justice and bring the sustainable peace and safe return of the victimized Darfurians to their misappropriated lands with full human dignity and effective compensations to be able to develop their own region, hinges on the firm insurance of full indiscriminate participation in both national and international decision making plans and processes for: 1) all Darfurian armed groups and civil society associations in Sudan and in the Diaspora; and 2) the Sudanese supportive civil society and democratic parties side-by-side with the formal representation of pre-election or post-election Khartoum and Juba governments.
The immediate post-elections’ eruption of war between Darfuris and the NCP-controlled government sent a clear message to the national and the international players in the peace process of Darfur: Fraud elections will not generate legitimate representation to settle the dispute inasmuch as military action prevails as a policy by the contending foes.
THE SUDANESE POLITICAL BALANCE
In the 2007 study on the elections’ prospect, we thought that the real dilemma inhibiting Sudan from implementing the CPA in the most desirable principled way was indeed determined by 3 (three) major domains: 1) the “nature of the ruling regime in the North;” 2) the balance of political forces in the North; and 3) the “structure and power relations of the ruling elite in the South.”
The three determining domains must be wisely tackled on equal terms of political attention in both national and international arenas: to help process the CPA in the present time to promote the North-South relations; to prepare the country for transitional elections and the South Referendum; to strengthen the Sudanese advancement to the permanent and just peace; and to speed up the march to stable democratic rule and equitable regional development.
The nature of the ruling regime in the North was definitely a determining domain in the present and future prospects of Sudan. The monopoly of central governments over the treasury and allocation of public funds (including tight surveillance over private monies under a coercive system of taxation and customs by the Ministry of National Economy and Finance in full collaboration with the State Security Department, Ministry of the Interior, Intelligence of the Armed Forces, the PDF, and the Janjaweed gangsters) have always guaranteed the effective exclusion of competitive opposition groups from power sharing, even if the latter groups were sufficiently prepared for democratic contests.
THE U.S. POLICY ON SUDAN
In opinions this writer exposed to the PBS NewsHour (April 21, 2010), the U.S. was expected to work closely with both the elected Government of Sudan and the democratic opposition parties and civil society groups to help: 1) end the crisis in Darfur; 2) implement the North-South CPA; 3) execute the International Criminal Justice decisions; and 4) improve US-Sudan bilateral relations to maintain regional and international peace.
To end the crisis in Darfur, the U.S. needs to sponsor with the United Nations, the African Union, the European Union, IGAD, and the Arab League an All-Sudanese National Constitutional Conference to resolve the crisis in Darfur based on full representation and full participation by all Darfuri armed and civil society groups, as well as the Sudanese national parties and civil society (especially the Umma, DUP, SPLM, the CP, and active human rights and democracy organizations), and the two elected governments.
To help implement the CPA treaty body, the U.S. needs to maintain a consistent friendly presence in the application of the peace process through the consultative functions of the States signatories to the treaty. The remote control politics the two CPA partners frequently exercised in the previous 5 years (2005-1010) indicated they operated in a climate of hostilities and lack of trust. The U.S. needs to play the role of an effective mediator with the two governments, as well as the democratic opposition which has been wrongfully excluded from effective participation in national decision making by the CPA power deals, despite the sizable weight of the democratic opposition in Abyei and the other peace and development agenda.
To help execute the ICC obligatory decisions, the U.S. needs to support firmly the ICJ decisions towards the crimes committed against humanity by State employees and militia groups in Darfur. This is a highly sensitive area that connects significantly with the root causes of the crisis and the essential procedures to end it.
Finally, the U.S. needs to improve the U.S.-Sudan bilateral relations to boost trade, developmental schemes, health programs, democratic education and technological advancement to win partnership of the strategic Arab-African nation in the ongoing global efforts to maintain regional and international peace.
CONCLUSIONS
Early in 2007, we suggested that the three political domains determining the transition to democratic rule in Sudan, as discussed in this analysis, namely the nature of the ruling regime in the North; the balance of political forces in the North; and the structure of the ruling elite and power relations in the South should be comprehensively tackled for a permanent settlement of the political crisis of the country. The piece-meal approach adopted comfortably by the NIF/NCP ruling regime, which has been mistakably encouraged by external powers (in the way the Darfur Crisis has been frustratingly handled and the way the CPA is increasingly failed) must be immediately stopped.
Following the 2010 elections, it was evident that the post-elections Sudan has been influenced by NEC-SPLM decisions that apparently fell short of the national aspirations of a unified Sudan versus the opposition’s movement to achieve a consistent march towards the unfulfilled agenda of the optional unity. These internal challenges are already discussed. In the international level, “Sudan is challenged by a number of international issues: foreign debt, new century’s agenda, environmental demands, trade, and Nile waters. The election results will not protect those accused before the ICC, and the movements of the accused officials will be completely paralyzed,” emphasized al-Mahdi.
To process the CPA in a principled manner; promote the North-South relations peacefully; and prepare the country for better outcomes by the South Referendum professionally and competently, an All-Sudanese National Constitutional Conference must be strongly emphasized by the UN, the AU, the US Government and the other concerned powers: the one-million miles country will have to be maintained by popular representatives in the best non-exclusionary traditions of their ancient Nation rather than throwing the fate of Sudan in the next decades under the brutal rule of the International Brotherhood and their ruthless regime.
The North-South unionist leaderships seemed to be agreed on the national strategic need to convene an all-Sudanese national conference that should decisively end the major disputes of the political crisis, namely the issues of national unity, Darfur, the transition to democratic rule, and the falling economics of the state. Perhaps the regional and the international concerned powers would equally join the vast majority of the Sudanese National Forces whose spokesperson pledged: “If the regime abrogates the repressive laws and allows the others to participate in national decision making, the regime might find a place in the arena. We will wait to see what they would do.”
* 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]