Sudan’s ex-spy chief promises to speak out on his disappearance from public eye

January 13, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – The former director of the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) Salah Gosh said that he will reveal the reasons that led to his disappearance from the public eye “at the right time”.

Gosh said at a ceremony organised in the Sudanese capital by people from his hometown that there are “objective reasons” why he stopped being seen in public.

However, he stressed that he will remain loyal to his party, its policies and programmes.

Gosh, once a powerful and longest-serving chief of the country’s intelligence apparatus was abruptly dismissed from his position as presidential adviser less than a year ago by Sudanese president Omer Hassan al-Bashir.

His removal came few days after he publicly fell out with the ruling National Congress Party (NCP)’s strongman and presidential assistant, Nafie Ali Nafie, over the dialogue Gosh was conducting with opposition parties under the umbrella of the Presidential Security Advisory (PSA), which Gosh chaired.

The ex-spy chief was later stripped of his leadership positions within the NCP fueling speculations in Khartoum on a possible coup attempt he was planning.

Gosh is the poster boy of counter-terrorism cooperation between the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Sudan’s NISS, over which he presided since 2002 until he was surprisingly demoted to the rank of a presidential adviser for security affairs in August 2009.

The ex-official is now a member of parliament representing Merowe constituency in north Sudan.

He said that among their in the NCP priorities is to work in synch with the various agencies whether state or federal, executive or legislative, in order to deliver the voice of the people to public officials.

(ST)