Imam Al Sadig Al Mahdi  -President of UP- Participated with this paper at the 1st Kampala Conference on 8-9 Feb 1999, about Human Rights in Transition in Sudan.

Literature

INTRODUCTION            SECTION I              SECTION II          SECTION III    SUMMARY 

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

SECOND BIRTH IN SUDAN IN THE

CRADLE OF SUSTAINABLE HUMAN RIGHTS

INTRODUCTION

Post-independence Africa made a false start. Some African states have actually collapsed.

 Sudan is in the threshold of such a calamity. The civil war, which started in 1963, was a limited local conflict in its first decade up to 1972. Its second decade was one of cold peace up to 1982. Its third decade was that of a regional conflict. However, from the mid nineties up to this day, it raged into a full scale National civil war with continent wide repercussions. The wounds it caused in terms of a million plus dead, hundreds of thousands disabled, three million displaced, a million plus refugees and the destruction of the social and material infra-structure in many parts of the country is a chamber of horrors.

The country’s economy was in the eve of independence viable producing enough to satisfy National consumption, and to pay for the National imports. The internal financial balance realized enough surpluses to finance a program of moderate Development. The external balance was in favor of the Sudan producing a healthy reserve. Income per capita was $550, which equals $3700 in 1998 Dollars[1]. The Sudanese pound was  $3.3 compared to its dismal current value of 0.04 of a cent[2].

All economic indicators about the Sudanese economy have registered staggering negative figures. The internal budget deficit sustained by losses in revenue due to a continuous fall in production, and due to huge extra expenditure to finance the extended civil war, and to pay for the numerous security organizations continued to rise throughout the “salvation” decade. The government continued to cover these huge deficits by borrowing and printing more currency. Consequently, the volume of money, which was 17 billion pounds in 1989, has shot up to 1600 billion Sudanese pounds in 1998. The external balance which was $700 million Dollars in deficit, sustained deficits of about $2 billions per annum throughout the decade. They were financed by dollar purchases from the black market, and expatriation of the gold possessions of Sudanese society[3].

One of the economic legacies of the second despotic Regime in Sudan (1969-85) is the elimination of the Sudanese budget surplus which resulted in making development dependent on external aid which came from the West, the East and the Gulf. For various reasons, all this external aid dried out during the “salvation” decade. The regime benefited from $1.5billion obtained by the democratic predecessor and disbursed during the despotic regime. Humanitarian aid from the various foreign sources actually increased despite the ungratefulness of the regime.

Therefore, development in the Sudan came to a stand still. Inflation continued to rise in treble figures, so that prices rose on the average about %4000 during the decade. Incomes, on the other hand, rose by an average of %500.

Another legacy of the second despotism (1969-85) is the external debt, which was $8 billions at the time, and grew through arrears and accumulated interests to become $20 billions to day. As a direct result of these developments, living conditions have become intolerable, employees have seen their pay shrink to about 3% of their necessary expenditures, and the percentage of the population living below the poverty line climbed to 95%[4]. Consequently, large numbers of Sudanese citizens left the country by legal and illegal means to seek economic asylum. This is only one of the reasons for the unprecedented Sudanese citizen flight from Home.

The “Salvation” Regime had established an oppressive Police State, which treated all citizens who do not support it as the enemies of God and the Nation. To sustain its aggressive military policies, the Khartoum regime gave top priority to military expenditure on the official armed forces, plus six more para- military organizations. Further, the regime encouraged the formation of tribal militias numbering now fifteen.

To support the Police state, the regime went beyond the Official Police Establishment. It formed five extra- Police security organizations to “wage war” against the civilian population.

In response to this oppression, the civilian victims have resorted to armed resistance. All political parties and regional political formations have established their own armies. The Sudanese Peoples Liberation Army, which was formed in 1982, has grown in numbers and combat commitment, to stand up to the enhanced military aggressiveness of the regime. Henceforth, the regime declared that its war effort is a JIHAD war in which the warriors had only two options: to vanquish the infidel enemy or to die in martyrdom. All opposition to the regime has acquired a military dimension to resist it.

As a result of these developments, there are now four military combat areas in the Sudan: In the South, the West, the North East and the Southeast. The coercive machine had not cowed the civilian population down. Their valor was “rewarded” with cruel punishments. That is how the record of human rights abuse in Sudan is so dismal: 8 condemnations by the UN commission of Human Rights.

From its inception, the Khartoum regime saw itself as a vanguard of Islamicist assertion. Therefore, its regional and international policies were closely linked with the forces of militant Islam.

Regionally, the regime supported the JIHAD organization in Eritrea, the Oromo Liberation Front, and other Ethiopian dissident groups, the Lord’s Liberation Army in Uganda (arguing that there is similarity between, them by reason of a common religious zeal), and numerous militant Islamicist groups, in East Africa, West Africa, and the Horn of Africa.

Internationally, the regime’s policies identified it with all the perpetrators of the radical Islamicist agenda, namely, the Iranian regime’s policies of militant Islamic assertion in the pre- Khatimi phase, the IRAQI regime’s Islamicist pretences when the BA’THIST regime decided to identify with Islamic slogans, and the whole wide numerous violent organizations, which decided to adopt terrorist policies to advance their causes. The regime’s expansionist policies went further. It formed the so-called Islamic and Arabic Peoples Congress, as a forum for International intervention.

 These developments made the Sudan a virtual minefield of violence. The Sudan became a regional and international nursery for the culture of violence. Sudanese society paid the price.

There are, to- day, about 5 million refugees in Africa (This figure does not include the African refugees outside Africa, who have grown in numbers in the last decade).

A refugee - according to O.A.U. definition- is a person driven by a justified fear, because of religious, ethnic, gender and/or political oppression. Added causes of human flight into refugee status, are foreign aggression, and economic impoverishment.

The number of displaced people in Africa to day is a staggering plus or minus fifteen million[5]. The Sudan alone account for three million refugees in Africa and others parts of the World! It accounts also for five million displaced people. One reason why the Sudan has been chosen as Venu for the O.A.U. ministerial conference in 1998, in spite of the prohibiting Security Council Resolutions, is the questionable distinction of the Sudan, being involved with a huge number of refugees and displaced persons.

By any standard, the Sudan to day is Venu to the worst humanitarian tragedy in the World.

How did it happen?

What is the way- out?

In his erudite study of History, Arnold Toynbee maintained that challenge, which is strong enough, could produce a response in the society, which is creative and constructive. If, however, the challenge is too light, that response will not be forth coming. If it is too strong, it could destroy the goose that lays the golden eggs.

Sudanese political experience could boast of an intensity and a variety, which is second to none. The challenge, which it faces currently, is intensive. It may manage to live up to it successfully, and in the process make creative history. It may crumble in the face of the challenge.

This presentation is my contribution to the conference on Human Rights in the Transition Period expected in the Sudan.

The presentation will:

·                                             Survey the modern history of the Sudan from a Human Rights point of view.

·                                             Outline the legacies of seven regimes, which governed the Sudan in modern history.

·                                             Propose policies and institutions to deal with these legacies to achieve justice and safe guard Human Rights.

·                                             Introduce the concept of sustainable Human Rights, and suggest how to realize them for a born again Sudan.

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