Sudan’s largest opposition party formally rejects participation in new government
September 24, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – The leader of the National Umma Party (NUP) al-Sadiq al-Mahdi ended months of speculations regarding his party’s willingness to partake in the upcoming government saying that the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) is not serious about letting other political powers have a role in decision making.
The dominant NCP has yet to announce the formation of the new government despite the passage of more than two months since the south officially became an independent state. Many posts in the government that were held by Southerners as part of the power-sharing protocol in the peace agreement are now vacant.
But the ruling party has been conducting extensive talks with the NUP and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which is the second largest opposition party in Sudan, to try and join the new government.
The NCP won a landslide victory in April 2010 general elections which has been marred by opposition boycott and logistical failures. Nonetheless the international community and election monitors have endorsed its results.
Analysts say that the NCP wants to bolster its legitimacy amid growing challenges facing the country such as a dire economic situation and flaring military conflicts in Blue Nile and South Kordofan states.
Al-Mahdi said that joining the government institutions which are responsible for what is going on the country right now, would be a move which contrasts the NUP’s philosophy.
The former Prime Minister called for engineering a new system which would transform Sudan from a party-dominated state to a nation-state and adopting new policies that would stop fighting, improve the economy and normalize ties with the international community.
Addressing the issue of the new government, al-Mahdi said the NCP simply wants to replace the Southerners who left the cabinet but without changing the rules of the game which is having the ruling party exclusively control the state.
Al-Mahdi described the NCP’s strategy with regard to bringing opposition parties on board with someone on death bed seeking cure through aspirin.
He said that the country faces growing international isolation including from neighbors whom some he said are occupying Sudanese land. The NUP chief mocked the government for complaining to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) against South Sudan while refusing to meet its delegation last May.
But the former PM warned that seeking a popular uprising similar to the ones that swept through the Middle East could create a “violent” situation like in Libya, Syria and Yemen.
The Sudanese presidential adviser and the NCP external relations secretary Mustafa Osman Ismail responded to al-Mahdi’s remarks by expressing regret.
Ismail said that the former PM pre-empted the outcome of the joint NCP-NUP committees and a planned meeting between al-Mahdi and president Omer Hassan al-Bashir.
(ST)