Sudan’s largest opposition party formally rejects participation in new
government
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September 24, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – The leader of the National Umma Party
(NUP) al-Sadiq al-Mahdi ended months of speculations regarding his
party’s willingness to partake in the upcoming government saying that
the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) is not serious about letting
other political powers have a role in decision making.
JPEG - 29.4 kb
Sudan’s former Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition
National Umma Party (NUP) al-Sadiq al-Mahdi (Reuters)
“The nominal participation [in the upcoming] government will only make
the nation more crazed,” al-Mahdi said at the Friday sermon prayers
which he led.
The dominant NCP has yet to announce the formation of the new
government despite the passage of more than two months since the south
officially became an independent state. Many posts in the government
that were held by Southerners as part of the power-sharing protocol in
the peace agreement are now vacant.
But the ruling party has been conducting extensive talks with the NUP
and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which is the second largest
opposition party in Sudan, to try and join the new government.
The NCP won a landslide victory in April 2010 general elections which
has been marred by opposition boycott and logistical failures.
Nonetheless the international community and election monitors have
endorsed its results.
Analysts say that the NCP wants to bolster its legitimacy amid growing
challenges facing the country such as a dire economic situation and
flaring military conflicts in Blue Nile and South Kordofan states.
Al-Mahdi said that joining the government institutions which are
responsible for what is going on the country right now, would be a
move which contrasts the NUP’s philosophy.
The former Prime Minister called for engineering a new system which
would transform Sudan from a party-dominated state to a nation-state
and adopting new policies that would stop fighting, improve the
economy and normalize ties with the international community.
Addressing the issue of the new government, al-Mahdi said the NCP
simply wants to replace the Southerners who left the cabinet but
without changing the rules of the game which is having the ruling
party exclusively control the state.
Al-Mahdi described the NCP’s strategy with regard to bringing
opposition parties on board with someone on death bed seeking cure
through aspirin.
He said that the country faces growing international isolation
including from neighbors whom some he said are occupying Sudanese
land. The NUP chief mocked the government for complaining to the
United Nations Security Council (UNSC) against South Sudan while
refusing to meet its delegation last May.
But the former PM warned that seeking a popular uprising similar to
the ones that swept through the Middle East could create a “violent”
situation like in Libya, Syria and Yemen.
The Sudanese presidential adviser and the NCP external relations
secretary Mustafa Osman Ismail responded to al-Mahdi’s remarks by
expressing regret.
Ismail said that the former PM pre-empted the outcome of the joint
NCP-NUP committees and a planned meeting between al-Mahdi and
president Omer Hassan al-Bashir.
(ST)
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