Sudanese opposition declares plans to end war with South Sudan

April 12, 2012 (KHARTOUM) – Leaders of Sudan’s mainstream opposition parties have announced they are due to meet on Monday, 16 April, to discuss ways of extricating the country from its current war with neighbouring South Sudan.

The National Consensus Forces (NCF), an opposition coalition including the National Umma Party (NUP) led by former Prime Minister Al-Sadiq al-Mahdi, the Popular Congress Party (PCP) of the veteran Islamist Hassan Al-Turabi, on Thursday said that their planned meeting aims to explore all possibilities of seeking a negotiated settlement to the war.

The ruling National Congress Party (NCP) in Khartoum has already declared public mobilisation following the occupation on Wednesday of Heglig – an oil-producing town in the country’s border state of South Kordofan – by South Sudan’s army.

“Our common direction is to play a role in stopping the war and negotiate with all sides in order to prevent the country from sliding back to an all-out war” said NCF’s Chairman Farouq Abu Issa in a press conference at the house of the NUP’s leading member Mubarak Al-Fadil in the capital Khartoum.

According to Abu Issa, the NCF has decided to put on hold all of its other agendas pending the meeting on Monday, adding that it is no longer possible to remain silent in the face of the current situation.

He further announced that the NCF is willing to sit down with all holders of arms in order to reach a negotiated settlement to the war.

“We will move to spare our country this war without waiting for approval from anyone” he said, in an apparent dig at the NCP.

It is unlikely that the NCP would be comfortable with any form of direct contact between the opposition and South Sudan or any of the rebels Khartoum accuses Juba of backing in the country’s border states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile.

The NCP has already accused the opposition of precipitating panic in the wake of Heglig takeover by spreading rumours about an imminent scarcity of fuel as a result of losing Heglig

Al-Haj Adam Youssef, head of the NCP’s political sector and second vice-president, said during a party meeting on Thursday that opposition parties had instructed its members to form long queues in front of petro-stations to delude citizens into believing that a shortage of fuel is happening as a result of Heglig situation.

Youssef assured citizens that the supply of fuel is stable and that the government would soon retaliate and reclaim Heglig.

(ST)