About a half dozen African leaders have secured their long-term political futures after tweaking their respective constitutions to allow them remain viable to engage in elective politics.

In the north, Egypt’s Abdul Fattah Al-Sisi, down the Sahara Chad’s Idris Deby Itno, on the West African coast Togo’s Faure Gnassingbe.

Cameroon’s Paul Biya shows no signs of slowing down with a seventh consecutive term secured in 2018. Then there is Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Denis Sassou Nguesso of Republic of Congo.

But whiles these long serving “servants” have usually hogged the media headlines with the schemes they employ to amend laws in their favour, there are a number of leaders who have left and others ready to retire.

In January this year, we published an article looking back at African leaders who left officeeither after losing elections or after serving their terms.

In this piece, we look at three leaders ready to leave office when their tenures expire. Mohammed Ould Abdul Aziz (Mauritania), Mahamadou Issoufou (Niger) and Beji Caid Essebsi (Tunisia).

Mohamed Ould Abdul Aziz

Came to office: After a coup d’etat in August 2008
Won elections: Restored democratic order and won two elections in 2009 and 2014 (for final term).
Tenure expires: This year with the swearing in of a successor.
Preferred candidate: Mohamed Ould Ghazouani, the former Minister of Defense.
Best remembered for: A clampdown on opposition bloggers, active participation in the G5 Sahel force.

Oul Abdel Aziz

Beji Caid Essebsi

Came to office: December 2014 after the Arab Spring ousted Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Tenure expires: When next elections are held in November, he is not contesting
Preferred candidate: Neither Beji of his Nidaa Tunis party have named one. His current PM Youssef Chahed is leading a new party, Tahya Tounes.
Best remembered for: Being Tunisia’s first democratically elected president.

“I will say frankly that I do not want to present for a second term because Tunisia has a lot of talents,” Essebsi said at a meeting in April of his party Nidaa Tounes in Monastir.

Tunisia’s president

Mahamadou Issoufou

Came to office: 2011 after overthrow in 2010 of Mamadou Tandja. Won 2011 elections and secure final term in 2016. 
Tenure expires: 2021 when next polls are to be held.
Preferred candidate: Mohamed Bazoum, the Minister of Interior
Best remembered for: Playing key role in migration crisis. Participation in G5 Sahel block and Boko Haram combat.

Niger president

At least four people have been killed across Sudan on the first day of a “civil disobedience” campaign, which was launched in the wake of a deadly crackdown on protesters by the ruling generals.

The Central Committee for Sudanese Doctors said that two people were shot dead in the capital Khartoum, while two others died in a hospital in Omdurman city after being stabbed on Sunday.

Protesters set about building roadblocks in different parts of Khartoum on Sunday morning. But riot police swiftly moved in, firing gunshots in the air before clearing the makeshift barriers.

Several vehicles of the feared Rapid Support Forces (RSF), blamed for the killings during the recent crackdown, were seen Sunday moving across some parts of the capital, loaded with machine guns.

Public transport was barely functioning and most commercial banks, private companies and markets were shut.

The Sudanese Professionals Association, a key protest group, on Saturday announced a nationwide “civil disobedience” campaign it said would run until Sudan’s ruling generals transfer power to a civilian government. 

“The civil disobedience movement will begin Sunday and end only when a civilian government announces itself in power on state television,” the SPA said in a statement, adding, “Disobedience is a peaceful act capable of bringing to its knees the most powerful weapons arsenal in the world.”

The call by the SPA, which first launched protests against longtime President Omar al-Bashir, came days after a bloody crackdown on protesters crushed hopes for a swift democratic transition.

Meanwhile, the doctors committee linked to demonstrators also blamed the ruling military council and paramilitary forces for the latest deaths. A total of 118 people have been killed since a crackdown was launched in early June to disperse a sit-in protest outside the military headquarters in the Sudanese capital.

The assault on a sit-in outside the army complex was led by the RSF, which has its origins in the notorious Janjaweed militia, accused of abuses in the Darfur conflict between 2003 and 2004.

Middle East Eye quoted a Sudanese military expert as saying this week that the head of Sudan’s ruling military council was given a “green light” by Saudi Arabia and its regional allies to crack down on protesters.  

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates backed the military council in the aftermath of the coup against Bashir by pledging $3 billion in cash and aid to the country.

Source: Presstv

Sudanese military forces have detained leading opposition members after they met with visiting Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who was in the capital Khartoum to help end the ongoing political impasse in the country.

Ahmed met representatives of both sides on Friday in a bid to revive talks between Sudan’s Transitional Military Council (TMC) and protest groups.

Among those who attended the meeting were opposition leader Mohamed Esmat and a leader of the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N), Ismail Jalab. Security forces arrested both men later on without giving any reason, their aides said Saturday.

“A group of armed men came in vehicles at 3:00 am (1:00 GMT) and took away Ismail Jalab .. without giving any reason,” said Jalab’s aide Rashid Anwar, adding that SPLM-N spokesman Mubarak Ardol was also detained.

“We don’t know where they are being held,” he added.

The meeting came days after the military raided a sit-in protest outside the army headquarters in central Khartoum, killing at least 30 people.

The protesters have been calling on the military rulers to hand over power to a civilian government.

The Sundanese military announced last month that it had unseated President Omar al-Bashir and later imprisoned him. It then set up the TMC to rule the country and promised to hand over after elections.

But protests, under whose pressure Bashir was forced out, have continued in Sudan, with people demanding that more civilians be on the council than military figures during the transition period.

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have already announced their support for the transitional military council. They have also expressed support for measures taken by the council following Bashir’s ouster.

A Sudanese military expert told the Middle East Eye on condition of anonymity that Sudan’s military ruler General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan had even discussed the recent crackdown on the protesters with Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.

“The breaking up of the sit-in was one of the main points on the agenda that was discussed. Unless he got the green light from his regional allies he would not have been able to commit such a crime,” he said.

The military expert was referring to a recent visit by Burhan to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.

Both Riyadh and Abu Dhabi have ties with Burhan and his deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, through their participation in the kingdom’s protracted war on Yemen.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had previously pledged to continue supporting the military transition council if Khartoum agrees to keep its forces in Yemen.

Source: Presstv

Inner City Press has asked UNSG Antonio Guterres and his spokesman Stephane Dujarric and others, “May 22-5: On Cameroon, what is the SG’s comment if any and action if any at all on for example that Paul Biya’s forces reportedly shot dead 4 month old Martha in Muyuka on 20th May?”

Now Egypt, whose strongman Sisi pals around with UNSG Guterres who has handed investigative Inner City Press‘ long time work space in the UN to a Sisi state media Akhbar al Youm whose retired correspondent Saana Youssef has not asked a question in years is lavishing praise for its business with Paul Biya’s Cameroun: in Cairo, “Cameroon Ambassador in Cairo Mohamadou Labarang commended the strenuous efforts exerted by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi to realize development in Africa.

The diplomat made the remarks late Monday during a ceremony held at the embassy on the Cameroon national day.   Labarang lauded the efforts exerted by Egypt under Sisi – the current chair of the African Union – to unite the continent and carry out development projects.   Thanks to Sisi, the African free trade agreement will go into effect by the end of May, he said.   He noted that the Egypt-Cameroon ties are excellent at the political level, voicing hope that the two sides would further cooperation in the economic score in the coming period.

Meanwhile, Egypt’s Deputy Assistant Foreign Minister for African Affairs Maher el Adawi underlined the depth of ties between Egypt and African countries.   He noted that Sisi ordered all state bodies to further ties with African countries, referring to Sisi’s visits to African states.   He added that Sisi will embark on a tour in eastern and southern African states within the coming few days.” The blathering about business with Biya is just blood money. Inside the UN, Guterres’ Global Censor Alison Smale, now leaving in August, controls a propaganda channel called UN News and a sycophantic press corpse including Sisi’s retiree while mantaining her ghoulish no due process ban on Inner City Press, now in its 322st day.

Source: Inner City Press

Sudan’s junta and protest leaders have ended another round of negotiations without any agreement on the structure of an interim government to rule the country following the ouster of president, Omar al-Bashir, with more talks planned on Monday.

After hours of negotiations through the night, the Transitional Military Council and the Alliance for Freedom and Change failed to finalize the makeup of the interim government that would rule for a transitional period of three years, media reported on Monday.

The ruling military council announced the talks would resume at 9:00 p.m. local time (1900 GMT).

“The structure of the sovereign authority has been discussed,” Lieutenant General Shamseddine Kabbashi, spokesman of the military council, told reporters. “It’s agreed to resume negotiations today (Monday) evening… hoping to reach a final deal.”

The Sudanese Professional Association — the group that initially launched the protest campaign against Bashir in December — said Monday that it was in no rush to finalize the deal.

“We are not in a hurry for the crucial victory… whatever be the outcome, it will be a step forward,” it wrote on Twitter without elaborating.

The junta and protest leaders have been at loggerheads on the leadership of the new governing body.

The junta leaders are insisting that the new body be military-led; however, the protest leaders say they are determined to have a majority civilian body led by a civilian.

The country’s new ruling body must be “led by a civilian as its chairman and with a limited military representation,” the Alliance for Freedom and Change representing protesters had said in a statement before the talks.

The existing military council is headed by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the generals insist that the overall new body be led by the army.

Cleric Mohamed Ali Jazuli said at a protest rally on Saturday in a warning to the military council that, “If you consider handing over power to a certain faction, then we will consider it a coup.”

Before talks were suspended earlier this week, the generals and protest leaders had agreed on several key issues, including a three-year transition period and the creation of a 300-member parliament, with two thirds of lawmakers to come from the protesters’ umbrella group.

But those talks were marred by violence after five protesters and an army major were shot dead near the ongoing sit-in outside the military headquarters in central Khartoum, where thousands have camped out for weeks.

Initially, the protesters had gathered to demand Bashir resign due to the dire economic situation in the country, but they have stayed put after Bashir’s ouster to exert pressure on the junta to step aside.

The protesters had also erected roadblocks on some streets in the capital to put further pressure on the generals during negotiations, but the junta demanded that they be removed and protesters duly took the roadblocks down in recent days.

The protesters, however, said they will put the roadblocks back if the army fails to transfer power to a civilian administration.

Source: Presstv

South Africa’s ruling African National Congress on Saturday marked its weakest victory in national elections in a quarter-century.

In an address to the country, returning President Cyril Ramaphosa paid tribute to those who voted in South Africa’s first election after the end of apartheid 25 years ago.

With all votes counted the ANC received 57.5% of the vote, down from 62% in 2014, the electoral commission said.

It was the worst-ever showing at the polls for the party of the late South African leader Nelson Mandela which has ruled since that 1994 election.

Voter turnout was another low at 65%, reflecting the frustration of many South Africans after corruption scandals around the ANC that led former president Jacob Zuma to resign last year under party pressure.

(Source: AP)

One month after ousting veteran president Omar al-Bashir, Sudan’s military rulers show no sign of handing power to a civilian administration and talks with protest leaders remain deadlocked.

Thousands of protesters remain encamped outside army headquarters in central Khartoum, vowing to force the generals to cede power just as they forced Bashir from office.

“We want civilian rule or we will stay here forever,” said protester Iman Hussein, a regular at the sit-in which protesters have kept up since April 6.

Protesters initially gathered at the army complex to seek the generals’ help in ending Bashir’s three decades of iron-fisted rule.

On April 11, the army toppled Bashir in a palace coup replacing him with a military council formed entirely of generals that has shattered protesters’ dreams of a civilian-led transition to democracy.

The deepening economic crisis that fuelled the four months of nationwide protests which led to Bashir’s ouster shows no sign of abating.

Huge queues form daily at ATM machines as the freezing up of the banking system forces consumers to use cash to buy basic goods made ever more expensive by the sliding value of the Sudanese pound.

The generals insist they will not use force to disperse the sit-in which protesters have kept up through the daytime fasts observed by Muslim during the holy month of Ramadan.

The generals have offered several concessions to placate the protesters, including detaining Bashir in Khartoum’s Kober prison, arresting several of his lieutenants and promising to prosecute officers who killed protesters during the demonstrations against the old regime.

– Winner ‘will be us’ –

But when it comes to the protesters’ key demand for a civilian authority to oversee a four-year transition, the military has simply dragged its heels.

“They are pressuring us with time, but we are pressuring them with our presence here,” said protester Hussein.

“One of us has to win in the end, and it will be us.”

Last month, the Alliance for Freedom and Change, which brings together the protest movement and opposition and rebel groups, handed the generals its proposals for a civilian-led transition.

But the generals have expressed “many reservations” over the alliance’s roadmap,

They have singled out its silence on the constitutional position of Islamic sharia law which was the guiding principle of all legislation under Bashir’s rule but is anathema to secular groups like the Sudanese Communist Party and some rebel factions.

The protest movement says the military appears intent on hijacking the revolution and determining its outcome.

Protest leader Khalid Omar Yousef told reporters on Wednesday that the movement was now considering “escalatory measures” like launching a nationwide civil disobedience movement to achieve its demand.

– US pressure –

The generals are under pressure too, with the United States and the African Union calling on them to ensure a smooth transition of power.

In a telephone call with military council chairman General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, US Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan, backed “the Sudanese people’s aspirations for a free, democratic and prosperous future”.

The State Department said Sullivan encouraged Burhan to reach agreement with the Alliance for Freedom and Change and “move expeditiously toward a civilian-led interim government”.

But the generals have strong support from oil-rich Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which have extended a $3 billion credit line to shore up the Sudanese pound and fund imports of basic goods.

Some members of the protest movement are optimistic however that the generals will ultimately cede power.

“They will hand over executive power to a civilian government if we present a credible, viable form of a civilian government,” opposition leader Sadiq al-Mahdi, the prime minister Bashir overthrew in an Islamist-backed coup in 1989, told AFP earlier this month.

“Because they know if ultimately they settle for a military dictatorship, they will be in the same position as Bashir.”

AFP

Days before Algeria’s 82-year-old strongman president Abdelaziz Bouteflika was ousted from power, the country made one last ditch attempt to keep control: it shut down the internet. A few weeks later, 75-year-old Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir’s rule ended with a picture of mainly female protestors going viral on social media platforms.

If there has been any common threads in the unseating of authoritarian African leaders in the past few months, then it has been age and the internet.

Indeed, the main contenders in Nigeria’s recent general elections were the incumbent Muhammadu Buhari, 76, and Abubacar Atiku, 72. Together with the likes of Cameroon President Paul Biya, Uganda President Yoweri Museveni, Equatorial Guinea President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo and a host of other African leaders, they share one thing in common: they are all over 70.

Yet, they are still keen on their presidential ambitions with some even amending constitutional provisions to extend their tenures – sometimes from hospital beds in other countries.

Only five percent of Africans are aged 65 and above, but the political expectation is that this five percent should set the agenda for the 70 percent or so Africans who are under 35 years of age. Already, the average life expectancy across Africa is between 61 and 65 years, which means that all these leaders are, statistically speaking, already living on borrowed time.

If there has been any common threads in the unseating of authoritarian African leaders in the past few months, then it has been age and the internet.

As more technology has become available to an average person in Africa, the continent’s technology challenge has  moved beyond access to harnessing tech innovations to how it can improve performance in areas like education, or health. We need leaders who value and are fluent in these new technologies and their promise.

Countries like Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Chad and Mali have some of the lowest human development indices in the world according to the UNDP’s Human Development Indices for 2018. These countries are also ones with some of the highest costs per 1 gigabyte of internet data — at around $10.

Despite these costs, across the continent are real examples of how the internet is changing lives. The mobile economy in 2017 alone added US$150 billion to African economies

But the internet revolution in Africa is encountering a bottleneck: elderly African leaders. And the reality is that these laggards are mostly  born generations before the rise of the internet. It has become obvious that the struggle of Africa’s older leaders to understand technology has had dire consequences for their citizens.

In July 2018, Uganda put a tax on social media and mobile money payments to raise revenue and “control gossip”. Within a day, certain accounts indicated a 60 percent drop in transactions. By December 2018, Uganda had lost 5 million internet users as a direct result of these taxes. The sharp drop in remittances meant that businesses were impacted in areas like agriculture, remittances from urban areas to family and relatives in rural areas as well as  basic e-commerce.

The Global Network Initiative reports that  between 0.4 percent and 1 percent of a country’s daily GDP is lost because of internet shutdowns, or about $6.6 million per 10 million users daily.

On January 15, 2019, Zimbabwe shut down internet connectivity for three days in a bid to quell public protests. According to Netblocks, this shutdown affected an estimated 17 million people and cost the nation’s economy some $17 million dollars.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s greatest asset is its youth. There are 420 million people between 15-35, of which just more than 30 percent are unemployed, according to the African Development Bank. Because the median age of an African today is 19.4 years, leaders should focus on transforming  African economies to become centers of entrepreneurial success.

Dr Abiy Ahmed of Ethiopia, currently Africa’s youngest leader at 42, believes that strengthening e-commerce and virtual government is more important than running state monopolies. By selling off half of the state-owned Ethio Telecom, he has demonstrated the willingness to open up the telcom sector to innovation.

Of course, it can also be said that younger African leaders are not always best equipped to modernize their nations. Rwanda’s Paul Kagame, 61, has improved e-governance and innovation to the point where his country ranks just behind Mauritius in a World Bank assessment of African business environments. His younger neighbor, the 54-year old Pierre Nkurunziza in Burundi, however still ranks among the lower performers in Africa 14 years in power after gaining power at the age of 40.  Youth itself is not necessary, but a youthful, outward-looking mindset is.

Many African leaders are also aware that the internet can provide the very tools that can threaten their political control.  They will be watching warily the situation in Algeria, where activists have used the internet as part of a campaign to challenge 82-year-old president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who has been in power for two decades.

One easy way African countries could revitalize their political leadership would be to limit political leaders to the civil service retirement age.

In Nigeria, the presidential contest was declared for Buhari, who at age 76 is 16 years older than the mandatory retirement age for Nigerian civil servants. Ethiopia’s Abiy Ahmed, on the other hand, would have to work another 13 years to even qualify for early retirement in his country. African voters should ask themselves which type of leader is better equipped to guide their countries into the future.

Source: Inter Press Service

In under a month, two African dictators have been brought down by mass protests. Algeria’s Abdelaziz Bouteflika, 82, and Sudan’s Omar Al-Bashir, 75, resigned after massive protests. Bouteflika had ruled Algeria for 30 years and was seeking re-election amidst declining health, while Al-Bashir had been at the helm of Sudan since 1989. These events have focused attention on long-serving dictators in Africa and how this wave might affect their political futures. Amongst them is Cameroon’s Paul Biya.

At 85, he has ruled Cameroon for 36 years and was recently declared winner in a hotly contested election that saw now detained opposition leader Maurice Kamto, declaring himself winner. There are striking similarities amongst the African dictatorships that have recently been toppled such as Gambia, Zimbabwe, Algeria and Sudan. These governments are characterized by huge deficits including dictatorship, long rule, abuse of institutions, poverty, corruption, and youth unemployment. These indicators are very present in Cameroon under the Biya regime and have implanted acute feelings of dissatisfaction, frustration and inertia triggering pockets of protest, resistance and rebellion across the country. Recent events in the country contain all the telltale signs of a regime in decline and a failing environment.

For a long time Paul Biya has relied on the usual dictatorial tactics to maintain his stranglehold on the country; ethnic divisions, brutal military crackdown on dissenters, arrest and imprisonment of opposition leaders, keeping a close college of cronies, most of whom are from his region of origin and have remained blind loyalists. Those that have shown signs of wavering have been quickly thrown in prison. Loyalists make dictators. Because above all else, the sustaining element of dictatorships is the willingness of a cross-section of the oppressed to not just acquiesce but to actively seek the oppression of all others. Biya has shrewdly eschewed a military coup, especially after the April 1984 attempt failed, by neutralizing the power of the military through the creation of several independent military and paramilitary bodies with him as the only centralized commander. In addition, the military, across its ranks is made up of members of his ethnic group.

The uncertainty of where power resides makes it difficult to stage a coordinated takeover. Following the October 7, 2018 presidential election, supporters of the leading opposition party, Cameroon Renaissance Movement (CRM) staged peaceful demonstrations protesting election results and the government’s handling of the ongoing socio-political crisis plaguing the country’s two English speaking regions. The leader of the CRM and presidential candidate, Maurice Kamto was arrested and has been in detention alongside 131 supporters. In the meantime, he has been charged with rebellion, inciting insurrection, offence against the president of the republic and treason amongst others. Charges which if found guilty, he and his supporters will be facing the death penalty. All forms of anti-regime demonstrations are immediately banned in the country ensuring and fostering a system in which there is no space for democratic expression.

The government and its supporters have attempted to downplay demonstrations by CRM as a parochial group of people from the Western region of the country, lacking nationwide support, but who want to muzzle their way into power. The fallout has been the increase in hate speech and tribalism, especially on social media with supporters of Biya and Kamto referring to each other as ‘sardinards’ and ‘tontinard’, respectively. These two derogatory appellations which have gained widespread use are interpreted to mean Biya supporters are a selfish bunch who vote based on receiving cans of sardines, while tontinards means Kamto’s supporters as miserly and cheap. This trend of ‘us’ against ‘them’ has bled through the country manifesting in the description of Anglophones as “Biafrans” and “Ambazonians”, and Northerners as “Sheep”.

This is a country disintegrating on the crucible of hate speech and ethnicity. Perhaps one of the early signs of a crack in the government of Biya is the new trend of leaks of sensitive and classified documents. Because the government has a long history of withholding information from the public, the recent upsurge in leaks is indicative of fault lines within the government ranks. Just over a week ago, classified documents were leaked detailing the president’s planned sojourn to Switzerland and the accompanying security details. Hitherto, this would have been majorly unheard of, and its occurrence now signals a lot. No other happening right now spells more trouble for the Biya reign than the ongoing crisis in the English speaking regions of the country. The crisis is caused by Anglophone perceptions of over 57 years of marginalization by the two successive francophone-led governments. The Anglophone regions voted to join the French speaking side in 1961 in a federation.

Anglophones have over the years complaint about the abrogation of the terms of the union including the dismantling of the federal system and the destruction and neglect of pristine Anglophone culture and institutions such as the English common law system and the Anglophone educational system and the underrepresentation of Anglophones in government. These grievances have bulged into calls for outright secession to create the putative state of Ambazonia. The government’s reaction to the Anglophone protest was characterized by military clampdown and what has been described as imposition of measures and solutions on the protesters. Essentially, the government has failed to productively handle the grievances leading to armed resistance.

The crisis has dealt a severe blow on the country’s economy with thousands being internally displaced, with over half a million refugees in Nigeria, hundreds have been killed and education has been halted in many areas in the Anglophones regions by separatist militia. This crisis poses a serious existential threat to the country as a whole but more so to the longevity of the Biya reign. And this is largely due to its economic impact. Though Cameroon is not officially classified as a fragile state by the World Bank, it contains all the indicators including weak institutional coping capacity to withstand external shocks, pressures and risks; it is facing violent conflicts, high unemployment, corruption and embezzlement, poor health and educational infrastructure etc.

Quite frankly, the economic threat posed by the Anglophone crisis is what might just tip the country over to open mayhem. It can be argued that the reason why there is still an uneasy stability in the country is because it has not been completely tethered economically. Cameroonians can still afford basic needs and daily food but the prices of basic commodities are on a steady rise especially with the stall of free-flow of economic activities and products from many parts of the English speaking regions. In 2008, the country witnessed a nationwide strike due to hikes in fuel prices. This is indicative, and the government should understand this by now, that it would be brought to its knees by economic pressures as prices of commodities continue to soar.

The state-owned agro-industrial corporation, the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC), is operating at below 10% of its capacity, losing billions as a result of attacks by separatists on their operations. CDC is one of the major employers in the country and the loss in production capacity has led to non-payment of salaries and arrears and general disgruntlement. It is only a matter of time before separatist block the flow of oil from the southwest region of the country as they have attempted and sometimes succeeded with other produce like timber. Blocking the flow of oil will paralyze the entire CEMAC zone which is dependent on the country’s oil refinery, SONARA. It is clear that the key strategy of separatists is to attack state institutions, stall their functioning, strain the government economically and then bring it to its knees.

Clearly, the government still survives because the crisis in the Anglophone regions and the protests in other regions like those spearheaded by opposition leaders have not been able to coalesce into a nationwide protest. However, with the current trend of economic decline, it is only a matter of time before economic disgruntlement matures into popular uprising. The trigger at that time, like in Sudan, might be something which a notoriously complacent regime would consider insignificant, such as bread.

Culled from Face2face Africa

A week after the fall of Sudan’s long-time President Omar al-Bashir, a huge crowd has converged in the streets of the capital, demanding the country’s transitional military council hand over power to civilians.

Hundreds of thousands of people packed the streets outside the defense ministry in Khartoum on Thursday, chanting “Civilian rule, civilian rule.”

Protesters waving national flags were also chanting “Freedom and revolution are the choice of the people.”

“We will remain in the street until power is handed to civilian authority,” said 24-year-old protester Samia Abdallah. “We will bring down military rule.”

Demonstrators joined a sit-in protest that began early this month outside an army complex, which houses the president’s residence and the defense ministry — the culmination of 16 weeks of protests which initially erupted on December 19, 2018, in the face of a government decision to triple the price of bread.

The protests finally led to Bashir being ousted and arrested after almost three decades in power.

The ten-man military council, which has taken power, announced a two-year transition period to civilian rule. The council has also promised to work with Bashir opponents and opposition groups to form an interim civilian government.

“We are completely committed to handing over power within a maximum two years,” one of the members of the council, Lieutenant General Salah Abdelkhalek said on Thursday.

“Perhaps the most difficult issue facing the military council now through its political committee is getting agreement from the political spectrum and the community forces on the naming of a prime minister,” Abdelkhalek said. “The ball is in their court.”

This is while Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have announced their backing for the transitional military council.

Chairman of Sudan’s Transitional Military Council Abdel-Fattah al-Burhan on Tuesday praised Sudan’s distinguished relations with Saudi Arabia and the UAE), official SUNA news agency reported.

Burhan, who is known for his ties to the Saudi kingdom, met with a joint delegation from Riyadh and Abu Dhabi this week, and received a verbal message from their leaders.

The council’s spokesman said on Thursday that the undersecretary at Sudan’s foreign ministry had been dismissed for preparing for the visit of a delegation from Qatar, the regional rival of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.

Spokesman Shams El Din Kabbashi said the ministry had made the statement without consulting the council.

Analysts warn that both Riyadh and Abu Dhabi are striving to influence the transition process by backing the military council.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE had cultivated close ties with Bashir before his ouster and were reportedly exhorting him to forge relations with Israel. 

With protests raging in Sudan, however, the London-based Middle East Eye reported in March that the head of Mossad had met his Sudanese counterpart in Germany as part of a secret plan by Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE to oust Bashir. 

Source: Presstv