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Day after day, the Sudanese take to the streets to protest the regime of Omar al-Bashir. The president, who himself seized power in 1989 after leading a coup d'etat,
faces the most serious challenge of his three decades in office.
Fury increases sharply in the cost of bread and fuel, and allegations of
corruption, fueled the protests.
Until now, the president has managed to resist the anger of his people.
But the Sudanese have a long history of overthrowing unpopular regimes.
Twice before – in 1964 and again in 1985 – revolts led to changes
of the government. Each time, the armed forces abandoned the regime
and sided with the people. This did not happen during the current
protests for good reasons, as pointed out by a university lecturer and author of the civil uprisings in modern Sudan, Willow Berridge:
The Al-Bashir regime has clearly learned from the mistakes of its
predecessors. He created a much stronger national intelligence
Security Services (NISS) as well as a multitude of other parallel security services
the organizations and armed militias that he uses to control Khartoum instead
of the regular army. This configuration, badociated with various commands
mutual fears of being held responsible for war crimes if the regime
falls means that an intervention of the army will not take place easily, as in 1964 or
1985. This is one of the reasons why the current uprising has been going on for longer.
than its precedents.
But the survival of the regime can not simply be seen as an internal problem.
He has powerful international allies. Omar al-Bashir avenged from the West
as a war criminal charged.
However, more recently, they began to consider it as a source of
stability and intelligence in a troubled region. The President also
the support – both political and financial – of key Arab allies.
Arab support
It is traditionally said that Sudanese are turning to Cairo from the north
support. This crisis is no exception. In December, the foreign affairs of Egypt
The minister and the intelligence chief went to Khartoum and announced their support for Al-Bashir.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry, who visited Sudan with intelligence chief General Abbas Kamel, said with badurance:
Egypt is confident that Sudan will overcome the current situation.
This was followed earlier this month during a reciprocal trip to
Cairo by the Sudanese President, during which President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi said:
Egypt fully supports the security and stability of the Sudan, which is an integral part of Egypt's national security.
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir at the 2015 AU Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa.EPA / Kim Ludbrook
But political support alone would not be enough to keep the Sudanese regime in power. There is also financial support from the other side of the Red Sea. In return for Yemen's entry into the war in Sudan, Khartoum would have benefited from investments worth 2.2 billion US dollars. More than 10,000 Sudanese soldiers are fighting on the Yemeni front line. Some would be child soldiers recruited by the Saudis, with offers of 10,000 USD for each recruit.
Other allies
Al-Bashir's rehabilitation in the United States goes back to President Barack Obama's time. As the last act of his office, he lifted a series of US sanctions against the Sudanese regime. The huge CIA office in Khartoum has been cited as one of the main reasons for its change of policy.
Washington is not the only one to have this point of view. As Europe struggles to limit the number of Africans crossing the Mediterranean, it has seen the Sudanese government as an ally. The "Khartoum Process", signed in the Sudanese capital, is essential to this relationship. In November 2015, European leaders met with their African counterparts in Valletta, the Maltese capital, to try to flesh out the backbone of this agreement. The objective was clarified in the accompanying press release from the European Union, which concluded that:
The number of migrants arriving in the European Union is unprecedented and this increase in flows is expected to continue. The EU, together with the Member States, is taking a wide range of measures to address the challenges and put in place an effective, humanitarian and safe European migration policy.
The summit led to the development of an action plan that has since guided the EU's migration and mobility policy objectives.
The plan outlined how the EU institutions would cooperate with their African partners to fight
irregular migration, smuggling and trafficking in human beings.
Europe has promised to provide "law enforcement and judicial authorities" with training in new investigative methods and
badist in the establishment of specialized police units in the fight against trafficking and smuggling.
These commitments constituted an explicit commitment to support and strengthen elements of the Sudanese State. A Regional Operational Center (ROCK) has been established in Khartoum, whose main purpose is to put an end to human trafficking and the flow of refugees by allowing European officials to work directly with their Sudanese counterparts. The Anti-Trafficking Coordination Center in Khartoum – composed jointly of Sudanese police and several European countries, including Britain, France and Italy – will partly rely on information provided by the Sudanese National Intelligence Service.
Finally, there is evidence of Russia's involvement in the Sudan crisis. Russian soldiers working for a private contractor were reportedly seen in the streets of Khartoum, suppressing the uprising.
Given the range of support for al-Bashir, it is not surprising that he managed to resist popular pressure to resign. It depends largely on the duration of the demonstrations and the strength that the regime is ready to deploy to crush its opponents.
Martin Plaut, Principal Investigator, Horn of Africa and Southern Africa, Commonwealth Institute of Studies, School of Advanced Studies
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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