A Controversial Chatham House Report on Sudan
Dr. Edward Thomas’s report for The Royal Institute for International Affairs (Chatham House), Decisions and Deadlines: A Critical Year for Sudan contains some very insightful remarks about the dangers and risks inherent in the months leading to the 2011 referendum and beyond. He wisely calls for the 
post-referendum’s arrangements to be addressed now, catering for the two options (a united Sudan or two separate states). He quite shrewdly states that “deals between the country’s two governing elites” should be reached in order to make sure that the conflict is not reignited. He puts his finger on the most imperative requirement by saying, the responsibility for a peaceful transition is principally with the (NCP) National Congress Party and the (SPLM) Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement.
This is the core of his report, with which I fully agree. Along the route to this conclusion, Dr. E. Thomas makes some remarks which are not only controversial; but misleading for others, especially if they build upon them or accept them as facts coming from a Sudan expert and a reliable authority .
The State
There is a contradiction in the way the report refers to the Sudanese state. It is described as “Sudan’s powerful centre” or “the powerful rich centre”; but he also says about it: “The state in Sudan is not inclusive and does not have the resources to control its vast territories”. How can it lack the resources to control its vast territories and be powerful and rich?
The spectre of the powerful rich centre which devours the margins is an unfair description of Sudan’s state.
Marginalisation Revisited
Another controversial assertion is the report’s judgement that: “Successive central governments withheld investment from Sudan’s Northern and Southern peripheries…” This is later qualified by a reference to “the colonial neglect of the periphery” being maintained after independence. The latter statement is true; but it too does not take into consideration the two civil wars (the first of which started in August 1955, i.e. before the declaration of independence!) and the second which was ended by the CPA in 2005. Both destroyed property and installations and made development impossible. To claim that the successive governments withheld investment willfully and arbitrarily is an unfair assessment.
The “Narrow” National Movement
The unfair streak of the report is most stark in the way the national movement is belittled. It is described as Sudan’s “narrow nationalist movement”. It is true that the call for independence started among the educated, detribalised vanguards of political parties and trade unions. These, in line with the case of many other countries crystallised in the most developed urban centres. This is still the case and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future. Paradoxically, a British academic criticizes the Sudanese National Movement for not having fought the British. Indeed, the nascent National Movement did fight the Turko-Egyptian occupation (which was fronted by none other than General Gordon of Khartoum). Later, it fought the Anglo-Egyptian occupation in the pan-Sudanese 1924 armed mutiny, as well as in uprisings in Darfur, The Gezira and the Southern Sudan. It is, however true, that the last phase of anti-colonial struggle was based on civil disobedience (influenced by the Indian model from which the National Movement adopted its name “Graduates’ Congress”). The National Movement in Sudan was more enlightened and well-read than most movements in Africa and the Middle East. It had links with the British Fabian Society and decided to take the side of the Allies (which included the British colonializers!) against the Nazis and fascists. Its leaders spoke on the radio to mobilize the people against Germany, Italy and Japan. They invoked the Atlantic Charter of 1942 to claim their right to self-determination as promised by Churchill and Roosevelt. They led delegations to Egypt, the UK and sent memorandums to the UN for their case. To describe such a movement as “narrow” exposes the narrow scope of the report writer’s list of “must-read” books before writing.
To imagine that Sudan’s conflicts will only be solved when “the concentration of wealth and power at Sudan’s centre is reversed” is wishful analysis worthy of reception parties at embassy lawns. The report even daydreams a scenario in which the vision of the SPLM is extolled — a New Sudan “where the marginalized majority took control of the state.” This rosy vision is no longer a distant futuristic paradise. The vanguard of the marginalized tribalized periphery, the SPLM, has indeed taken full control, — thanks to the CPA of the Southern Sudan — an area, the size of France for five years. One of the SPLM’s own ministers Nhial Deng Nhial has testified to a US Congressional hearing on 7 December 2009 about the way money was embezzled. Ten NGOs (all sympathetic to the South) have issued a “wake up call” report about the dire situation in the South in all fields, security, governance and the economy.
The Chatham House report itself provides an example of the lack of capacity which affected the implementation of the CPA. The census was accepted by the UN organizations; but the response of the SPLM was “disorderly”. It endorsed the census results in May 2009 then rejected them in June 2009! It is illuminating to add that the leader of the SPLM himself had declared before the completion of the census that any result which did not put the number of Southerners at 15 million would be rejected.
SPLM Capacity
There are two other flaws in the report. It says that the SPLM remains “the only national political movement”. This is not true. SPLM’s spokespersons in Washington DC called for sanctions on the North only. If they knew that they had a tangible northern constituency, they would not have made such a grave error of judgement.
National Congress Party
The second (equally flagrant flaw) is the reference to the NCP split without indicating that the split (2000/2001) meant transformation from a pan-Islamic pan-Arab party hoping to take over leadership from Egypt and Saudi Arabia into a national Sudanese party with a local political project as the main compass. Most of the demonization of Sudan including the ICC saga stems from a dated pre-split analysis. A recent Economist writer was puzzled by the fact that President Bashir is the favourite to become reelected as President. There is no secret. He and his party represent the present day leaders of Sudanese nationalism. This is his source of energy and defence in the face of the politically motivated ICC, with its contempt for other non-European cultures.
The report gets some facts wrong. The claim that “some NCP elements have spoken about a “black belt” surrounding Khartoum” a reference to the Southern displaced living in the shanty towns of the capital is wrong. In fact the words were used by SPLM leaders before the CPA’s signature. Their threat to mobilize the “belt” did materialize when the late Dr. John Garang died in an air crash in July 2005. A rumour spread that he was killed by the “Arabs”. The illiterate Southerners around the capital spontaneously descended on the streets of the capital assaulting innocent civilians and burning. There was a Northern backlash the following day. Those ugly scenes have galvanized popular Northern tendencies for secession.
The International Community
As far as the international community is concerned, the report cites the support which facilitated the CPA and the further support needed for the critical months ahead; but it is silent about the contradiction at the heart of the International community’s policies. How can the Sudan be asked to demonstrate the “peace dividends” to its citizens while extensive stifling sanctions are piled up against it? How can it reconstruct if the multi-donor fund (with $424 million) has not spent any significant amount on health facilities in the South?
National Security Law – Guantanamo?
The report naively repeats opposition complaints about the National Security Law which was passed by the National Assembly in December last year. A comparative view-finder would have helped the writer. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 in the USA and 7/7 in the UK did not represent a serious threat to the state. By comparison, terrorists actually reached the twin city of Khartoum, Omdurman, in May 2008. Laws enacted in Sudan are not comparable to the draconian laws in the USA and UK’s response.
Furthermore, the report was based on many interviews; but some of the references cited are not reliable or enough for the inference drawn. It refers to two text books in order to illustrate a discrepancy of different visions; with the Northern syllabus seen as deficient in the representation of Africa. There are in fact enough references about the role of the Northern movements and central governments in support of the National Liberation Movements in Africa (South Africa, Congo, Eritrea, Mozambique, Algeria) Nelson Mandela mentioned the way Sudan received him when he had no passport or visa. The report did not mention that in the Southern syllabus which he quotes Arabic is not taught (in breach of the CPA). The extremists were even scolded by Salva Kiir himself when they replaced the Sudanese National flag with the SPLM’s flag.
US Policy
The most potentially detrimental aspect of the report is its Prendergastian tilt (a reference to John Prendergast formerly of The International Crisis Group and now Enough who opposed the CPA and the DPA and called upon the USA to militarily attack Sudan and stop funding the elections).
Dr. E. Thomas is not a great fan of General Scott Gration’s mission in Sudan and casts aspersions on it. He says the new US policy has its critics – who are the groups seeking to overthrow or isolate the NCP. He then controversially says that “UN and foreign diplomats express misgivings about US leadership at a time when it is still entangled in Iraq and Afghanistan”. One wonders, which diplomatic missions gave the writer their negative impression about the new US policy; since the EU, the AU and IGAD partners are all on board. Even the Save Darfur Coalition has been included in the New USA Sudan policy. It is precisely because the USA is entangled in Iraq and Afghanistan that the new policy of engagement with Sudan is prudent. The USA cannot be seen to attack yet another Muslim majority country (while closing an eye on Israeli intransigence and Gaza brutality). Financially it would also be more difficult to undertake such an adventure.
In a nutshell, Dr. E. Thomas’s Chatham House report on Sudan has drawn the correct conclusions and recommendations; but it has — inbuilt in its logic — several misleading assumptions and certitudes.
Khalid Mubarak is a Sudanese writer and academic. He wrote this in his personal capacity.
Dear Khalid, are you the selfsame Khalid Mubarak who is press officer at the Sudanese Embassy in London?
Yes; but this is my opinion as a writer and academic who is affiliated to the National Unity Government. I have not written this article in my official capacity. I also write fiction (plays or short stories) which speak only in my voice ; not that of the embassy .
Dear Dr Khalid
No one denies that this is a critical year for the Sudan, and no one can deny that the Sudanese face really serious issues that them alone (the Sudanese) can answer too.
I wish you have answered to the conclusions and recommendations of the report, while I do respect your attempts to correct what you consider errors in the report.
At this time and juncture in our country’s history, denial serves no purpose, nor does it help to compare which law is draconian and which one is more draconian. It does not help us at all to prove or disprove which country supports what and condemns what. The ICC was discussed and debated, on this blog. But the question still remains, and the report points to this, it may have ,by default or design, missed or misrepresented some details, just as you yourself missed some here. You refer to the split as being in 2000/2001,when in fact it is in 1999.
I agree with you many seems to take the NCP and NIF as synonymous, however the fact remains,that the Islamic Movement, under whatever name has led the country into the present day situation, our immediate problem now is how to avert the fragmentation of the country.It is thus time for the NCP to come out with it’s agenda to avoid that.
You deny that the SPLM/A is not a national political movement,and has no constituency in the North.I sincerely hope you would review this statement. It is not my intention to go into a defence of the SPLM/A as national political movement,it’s members can do that better,but i believe you read it’s literature and pronouncements.
You refer to the (terrorists) who reached Omdurman and Khartoum,May 2008. That was an attack carried out by the Justice and Equality Movement, with which the NCP is about to start a new round of negotiations in Doha, Qatar. Moreover the laws that all the opposition parties want repealed, were there before 2008. They were not enacted in 2008. However the issue is not the law,the issue is how is applied and by whom.
Dear Dr.Khalid
What the Sudan needs to-day is more than mere PR campaigns to exonerate some and condemn others,w e all make mistakes, and it is only when we admit them and correct them that we succeed, and as the report says this is one year only to decide how we go about it.
“The illiterate Southerners around the capital spontaneously descended on the streets of the capital assaulting innocent civilians and burning. There was a Northern backlash the following day. Those ugly scenes have galvanized popular Northern tendencies for secession.” Khalid Almubarak
I would not have responded to this hate article if not for the integrity of this website. Dr Khalid Almubarak, I don’t know who you directed your anger at; Southerners, SPLM or Chatham House. Whoever is the victim of your wrath, I want to let you know, Brother Khalid that our country, Sudan is in deep crisis,it has been in crisis since independence.
It will not help whether you apportion blames to foreigners or demonise other parts of Sudan as evil and unworthy. It will only take Sudanese themselves to sit down and solve their problems.Whether you deny it or not there is inequality and marginalisation in the Sudan.
The fact that you still describes Southerners in Khartoum as “The illiterate Southerners around the capital” even after over 20 years of staying in Khartoum shows that there is inequality in Sudan. Have you also asked yourself why those Southerners in Khartoum are the “illiterates” and the “Civilian Northerners” are not? Have you asked yourselves why Southerners are around the capital and not in the capital of their country?
I will not join you in your hate drama but one thing is true after one read your article. While you and the NCP meant to challenge the Chatham House Report, the venom of hate against other Sudanese in your article vindicate everything written in the Chatham House Report.
Dear Khalid,
If we accepted what you’re saying about your posting, as it is your personal opinion and your are entitled to have that, but will your official opinion be different, as government media man (spin doctor) do you have an opinion which different from Ambassador Omer Sidig? If that the case please let me know.
I don’t think Eddie’s report is controversial. I think it is well prepared, and addressed the core issues which facing Sudan now, and in the few coming months. One good thing about the Comprehensive Peace Agreement ( CPA) is it came with a clear modalities of implementation, which included clear time frame for what needed to done and when, if we carry an audit now it will fail. The CPA was supposed to address two main issues:
1- The democratic transformation
2- The right of the people of South Sudan to vote for self-determination in 2011, with a consensus that the parties will work to make unity attractive.
Five years later people are still not allowed to practice their full democratic rights, as most of the laws which contradict the basic democratic right still in place, and there is now intention from the NCP to change them, just two months ago the state minister in the internal ministry had been arrested by the police because he was exercising his democratic rights by demonstrating in front of the parliament building.
With regards to 2011 referendum for self-determination, I think unity has been made more unattractive in the last four years.
The issue of strong centre with no control over the peripheries, I do agree with Eddie that the cause of all the problems in Sudan is due to the control of the centre, during more than fifty years since independence, everything is concentrated on the centre, and the reason why it lost its control over some of the peripheries because they rebelled against that. Sudan needs genuine devolution of power, what so called federal government is not real, as the elites in the central what to dictate and control everything.
Sudan is facing very critical months ahead, with deadlock over the accuracy of the census, the demarcation of the election constituencies, and voters’ registration, that will overshadow the election process. Now the SPLM in south Kordofan decided not to contest the election because of that, many questions on whether election will be held in Darfur or not, 2011 referendum in the south and the poplar consultation in south Kordofan and southern Blue Nile, and also the problem in Abyei.
That really needs honesty and collaboration from all the stakeholders to avert Sudan from descending into deep troubles.
Dear Khalid,
I fear you are stirring controversy where none really exists. As you agree, the core hypotheses and arguments of Eddie Thomas’s report are insightful and command broad agreement. No-one can challenge the fact that 2010 is a pivotal year for Sudan.
The analysis, opinions and prescriptions contained in the report are well within the middle range of views expressed in Khartoum on a day-to-day basis. I have been in Sudan for the last week talking to quite a broad range of people and found much more radical or controversial views quite openly stated. I think moreover that ‘Prendergastian’ is an unwarranted slur. Eddie knows Sudan well and is far too sensitive to Sudanese society for that to be appropriate.
“The report did not mention that in the Southern syllabus which he quotes Arabic is not taught (in breach of the CPA).”
It is clear that Khalid Mubarak has never been to South Sudan of late. As a matter of fact, a lot of schools in South Sudan still function in Arabic today, much to the chagrin of a lot of Southern “nationalists” who have been pushing for an end to the Arabic syllabus. I visited South Sudan in July. In the former Equatoria provinces, sometimes known as the most separatist of Southern regions, there is a significant chunk of the education system that functions in Arabic. Mr. Mubarak needs to get his facts right on this one.
Thanks
!- The split which ousted Turabi was a process ; like any friction inside parties. It began before 1999 and was confirmed and consolidated until
2001.
2- I agree that there is unbalanced development in Sudan; but it did not occur as a result of a conspiracy.The first civil war began before independence. How can the North be blamed for it?
We can only unlock the talents of our people if we create a fairer and just society;but that takes time. It should be a long term project(giving priority to the less developed regions )
3-Errors can start a life of their own, Alex. They can snowball and cause misunderstanding. For example; in 1983 SPLM literature claimed that power and wealth were concentrated in the Khartoum-Kosti-Sennar triangle. This mutated in the badly researched Black Book (whose writers imply that Black =Bad!) as control by certain ethnic groups. This too resurfaced in a different form (after the census)when the highly respected former South African president said in a speech that the root cause of Sudan’s conflicts is the fact that “a minority of the population concentrated in and around Khartoum, maintained a stranglehold over political power and economic resources” !!! Next month someone might say that certain streets in Khartoum control the whole Sudan.
4- Defenders of the mismanagement of the South for five years are in denial,not writers like me. The thesis that the tribally anchored and less developed parts of the country are the best qualified to lead it and “fix “it is a fallacy which was shattered by SPLM performance in the South since 2005. The whole world has seen the New Sudan . Nobody; including the most ardent SPLM supporters in the West can defend it.
Of course , Southerners can do much better; with training and time. No magic wand will do the business now overnight.
5- There was no “hate” in my article .The writer does not know that I
have written and produced a play based on Southern Sudanese animist rituals in 1976 many years before the SPLM was formed. I took my students to the Friday dances in Haj Yousif to watch the movements.We made a documentary for German TV(Directed by I. Michelli) . Sudan TV showed our play after the University and National Theatre performances.
6- I am right about the syllabus in other areas .The writer might be right about the former equatoria provinces.I thank him for the information.
7- I believe I was fair to Dr Thomas whom I respect.What I resent is the tendency of some intellectuals to be certain and judgemental ;as if standing on the perfect moral and political high ground.I am an admirer of Western democracy and freedom ; but I believe that the West should be more humble after the invasion of Iraq (based on a lie) with disregard to the millions who demonstrated against it. It should also be humble after Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo and the Gaza siege .
There seems to be a “line” about Sudan fed by half truths . It is our duty as Sudanese to answer. Silence will only breed more misunderstanding in the future.
Thanks to Dr Khalid for clarifying the provenance of the term “Black Beltâ€, and also for picking up on my careless use of the word “narrow†to describe the nationalist movement in Sudan. He’s entirely correct to say that it was a diverse movement at the outset: the White Flag League and the 1924 revolution were led by Ali Abdul Latif and was influenced by events at the conference of Versailles and the revolution in Egypt a few years before. He and his colleagues helped open Sudan to these influences. Working from within the military – one of the most diverse colonial institutions – he and his supporters were drawn from Nuba and Southern groups as well as the sons of the Nile Valley elite. When they were tried for mutiny in colonial courts, some of his supporters refused to identify themselves by ethnic origin – at the time, the Arabic word for nationality, jinsiya, was used to describe ethnic groups, but they believed in a Sudanese nationality.
Many in the Nile Valley elite supported the harsh sentences of the colonial courts. They borrowed Ali Abdul Latif’s slogan – Sudan for the Sudanese – but they developed a view of Sudanese-ness that was inspired by the cities of the Arab Mediterranean and the Hijaz. Because Sudan came under two colonial powers, Egypt and Britain, debates about the orientation of Sudanese nationalism, and about the need to mobilise Sudanese society for resistance, got lost in the tactical games between the two colonisers, and their supporters in the Nile Valley elites. Post-colonial regimes never quite managed to match the commitment to Sudan’s diversity of the White Flag League. I agree with Dr Khalid that the transformation after the NCP split was important – I think that the current rulers of Sudan have had three different “regimes†– the period of militancy, when the centre declared a jihad on some regions; the split, which focused the current leadership back on its base in the Northern Nile Valley; the CPA period, which was in President Bashir’s words, a “second independenceâ€, a revisiting of the nationalists post-independence settlement, an attempt to come to term with Sudan’s diversity, to be evaluated by one set of its citizens, the Southern voters in the referendum. I’ve argued in another post about what the next “regime†in Sudan might look like. The NCP has managed to transform itself several times, and it needs to transform again if it is to stay in power – probably towards a kind of nationalism that recognises and mitigates the continuing unrest in the poor regions of Sudan.
It is indeed ironic, as Dr Khalid points out, to hear people writing from Britain to complain about insufficient radicalism in the Sudanese anti-colonial movement – but it might not be all that new. After all, the first Anti-Imperialist Front (a forerunner of the Communist Party) was set up with the help of the English conscript Herbert Storey and other members of the Communist Party of Great Britain. Long before Storey, Irish Fenians like JJ O’Kelly travelled to Sudan to support the Mahdist fight against the British Empire. O’Kelly saw the Mahdi as a social and economic reformer and wrote, “The new champion of Islam might strike hands with the French and German socialists as a man after their own hearts only somewhat more thoroughâ€.
I think that like Storey and O’Kelly, I’m probably guilty of projecting my own political hopes and dreams on Sudan – I think that Sudan suffers because of the way it enters the political imaginations of outsiders. These strong feelings of outsiders like myself can contribute to misrepresentation. But strong feelings aside, I’d like to make clear that, as an anti-imperialist, I do not support foreign military intervention in Sudan, and never have done.
—
References to 1924 revolution: see Elena Vezzadini, The 1924 Revolution: Hegemony, Resistance and Nationalism in the Colonial Sudan, Bergen 2008 (see page 289, for a note on the trial). References to Irish support for Mahdism are not so easy to find, but see http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0824/1224253139461.html for the O’Kelly quote, or Omer ‘Abd al-Raziq El-Naqar, ed, dirasat fi tarikh al-mahdiya, 1, Khartoum 1981, page 189.
Dear Dr. Khalid,
You asked: “I agree that there is unbalanced development in Sudan; but it did not occur as a result of a conspiracy.The first civil war began before independence. How can the North be blamed for it?”
My answer is that: Yes, the first civil war began before the independence of Sudan, because apparently after the merger of the South and the North into one administrative region by the British in 1946 and with progress on the independence issue, the South was able to see that it is different from the North, and was also legitmately afraid of eventually been subsumed by the political power of the bigger North. That is why before the Independence, the South was insisting on having their independence as a separate state apart from the North. And it was the North who talked the South into accepting the Independence of One Sudan, promising to correct this “unbalanced development” and other concerns after the independence. Eventually, the North maintained its uncontested control over the power seats of Sudan in Khartoum since 1956 and until this very moment in time and history, but never respected or honored what it promised the South. That is why the North is to be blamed. As simple as that.
You said: “We can only unlock the talents of our people if we create a fairer and just society;but that takes time. It should be a long term project(giving priority to the less developed regions”
And I ask you: For the last 55 years of the history of Sudan, the North was in power and was able to theoretically promote this state of “fairer and just society” in Sudan, but it never consider to do this. How more “time” the North need to do it if 55 years are not enough time? let us wake up and be real.
“By comparison, terrorists actually reached the twin city of Khartoum, Omdurman, in May 2008. Laws enacted in Sudan are not comparable to the draconian laws in the USA and UK’s response.” -Khalid AlMubarak
Khalid AlMubarak,
With all due respect, there is a lot of nonsense in your criticism of the report and you added a lot of unnecessary insults and slurs. Its rather disappointing and sad that this is the quality of embassy press officer commenting and personal opining that we have. This is exactly the sort of nonrepresentational authority that is unacceptable to our country. Your words are a stark reminder of the kind of totalitarianism that even a technocrat can harbor. It is vitally important that Sudan retains its oppositional capacity to counteract this sort of diatribe.
-Jamal
1 You are entitled to your opinion Jamaledi ; but there is no opinion in your message. Try to refute some of the things I said. You can’t. Your alternative is to attack me.
2-Thanks Ahmed Hassan
The difference between short term and long term is vital. We can accelerate the pace of development or change; but we cannot jump over it (as we have tried to do –example the mismanagement in Southern Sudan). Please read the article of Dr Justin Ambago Ramba in Sudan Tribune about banking in the South. Unlike you and me, he is a southerner.
What I am saying is that we must train people; spread education and even begin to change the way of life of cattle dependent ethnic groups all over the country.
Nobody is advocating another 55 years; but the delusion that the least developed and most tribally infected parts of the country are the best qualified (through the barrel of the gun if necessary) to lead has been dealt a fatal blow by the performance of the Government of Southern Sudan. Can you defend the GoSSs record? If so, go ahead please.
Dear Dr. Khalid,
Development and changes are natural processes that are always there, even within what seems as the most stagnant of situations, however, with manifestations at various paces. It is eventually those who own the resources and power and who are positioned to play a facilitating role of development support providers, which is the primary function of the state that can ultimately accelerate or cripple this process. No one can deny that the North was always in charge of Sudan power seats since the independence of Sudan, and was positioned to be the provider of the development planning and support in both the South and the North of Sudan, but nonetheless did not reflect any genuine interest or effort in accelerating that process or attending to the basics of human needs in the South. If this was not a conspiracy of an intentional and planned policy of creation of regional disparities to consolidate the North power in the centre, it is by no mean a product of chance and coincidence.
With all due respect to Dr. Justin, I do not see relevance, as well, for your statement that we are not Southerners. I am a Sudanese and the South is a part and parcel of my country – so far. I simply do not have that attitude of categorizing the Southerners as “othersâ€, as most of my fellow northerners seem eager to do. Anyway, I respect the views of Dr. Justin, and the views of whoever brings a thesis or its antithesis within the diversity of the South, while not necessarily have to agree or disagree with any specific one of them.
Definitely I do not defend the GoSS record, as you may see from my various contributions in this forum. I have referred several times to the issues of mismanagement, corruption, lack of democratic and transparent governance, and inability to accommodate and acknowledge the vast diversity within the South by the SPLM and the rest of the South leaders in the past and currently, however, that does not make an angle of the Government of North Sudan. The North was responsible by and far from the state of underdevelopment in the South. Moreover, I do sincerely believe that the North was responsible to a great extent in bringing the whole Sudan and the affairs between the North and the South to what we are witnessing today.
“The report naively repeats opposition complaints about the National Security Law” Almubarak, Cultural Attache at the Sudanese Embassy- London
The humiliation we experienced under the tyranny of the security forces was not “a complaint” it was a tragedy you missed while you were abroad. During the couple of years that you spent in University of Khartoum didn’t you never asked how many times the security forces were chasing your students across the corridor of your office shelling them with tear gas, burning them with moltov bombs and beating them with rods of steel? Haven’t you heard about bullets being shot at your students at the campus? Didn’t you know how many students were taken to the ghost houses, beaten, raped and even killed? Haven’t you ever heard Lt. Gen. Salah Gosh – NISS director threatening everyone last March that they are ready to cut off the limbs of those who support the ICC? If you didn’t please refer to the archive of Sudanese newspapers at your embassy.
The couple of years that you spent here waiting for your appointment at the embassy made you ‘naively’ believe and ‘naively’ promote your governments propaganda. I admire your courage trying to polish a tarnished history of a dictatorship who never tried to conceal his ugly face.
Are you by any chance the same Khalid Mubarak who studied in Leipzig, Germany?