The Two Sudans: The Politics of Retaliation and the Perturbing Stability in the Region
5 min readBy KuacBarjok, New York, USA
April 4, 2015 (SSB) —- Last night I read an article with an inquisitive eyebrow on Sudan Tribune and although I don’t always dwell much on particular things on this reputedly Paris based Website, I find this more enthralling and thus, got myself goaded to write this article in the light of the recent politics of hit, hide, and whine type of Sudanese politics. The Sudan has been at war with itself since the British, its former colonial masters left in 1956, even before then, the British colonial administration found it quite challenging to control and peacefully manage the pugnacious politics of culture, race, and religions in the Sudan.
Of the many contending religions and traditional beliefs, Islam and Christianity have always shoulder the religious differences and mind-boggling wars of horrendous destruction in the Sudan. In any case these two religions have a case to settle on a common ground and imaginably sign a treaty of non-aggression and live peacefully.
The Islamic State of Iraq’s insufferable atrocities against Christians, churches, and the infidels in the Middle East is a typical example of how religious wars, alas, shaped lives in Sudan in the past and in some parts now, I would argue.
To begin with, the History of Sudan is always challenging to appropriately chat on except when one is making a particular point in relation to what happened and associate that event to what is happening today and likely to repeat itself in the near future, thus, the importance of History. I’m no historian, however, I do smell the Sudanese historical actualities and mendacities from a distance, a little bit of snobbery, but yes my historical radar is undoubtedly charged and lively.
On 9 July 2011, the Africa’s largest country was divided into two republics precisely as a result of utterly degenerating form of governance sturdily propped by conflicting cultures, race and many others. In a nutshell, the people of the then Southern Sudan mostly Blacks and Christians were shrilly discontented and felt exceedingly repressed under the successive Khartoum regimes who are mostly Brown and Muslims (perceived Arabs?) ever since the colonial masters left which is evidenced by a nearly no development in the South.
Insecurity and poverty were the only realities in the eyes of the Sudanese population. This is not an attempt to say there’s full stability or development today in both conflicting sister countries, both countries are still struggling in almost everything but then at least something has changed as the past will/shall always be behind.
Since the formation of two Sudanese republics in 2011, the two administrations of Sudan and South Sudan have had conflicting issues ranging from contending border issues, backing each other’s rebels’ movements, and continue to craft grounds for conflicts today, alas. Back to the article I read last night on Sudan Tribune “Sudan renews accusations of Juba’s support over rebel groups” (link: http://bit.ly/1BWNFwQ ).
In the aforementioned article, Ibrahim Ghandour, Sudan’s presidential adviser, renewed unverifiable accusations against the South Sudanese government to be purportedly supporting the SPLM-North, an armed opposition group battling President Bashir’s Khartoum government. This is not the first time the Republic of Sudan is making such warmongering statements to their newly licensed neighboring government of South Sudan.
Given the irritating relations between the two Sudanese governments, it is hard to discard nor imprudently dwell on these accusations either, therefore, it is better to warily analyze the perturbing situations that these accusations are forlornly hatching. The troubled government of South Sudan has been making and continues to make similar accusations of Khartoum Government allegedly supporting the rebellion in South Sudan under the auspices of the former Vice president-turned rebel.
Dr. Riek Machar, South Sudan’s former vice president, is said to have staged a coup against his former boss, President Salva Kiir, and declared insurgence soon after ostensibly failing to eject Salva Kiir from the throne. Since the two Sudans’ governments have wars within, their accusations are likely to be true and worth a great deal of attention when dialoguing on the regional stability.
As I mentioned in the beginning, the Sudans have always been at war either directly or directly with the recent direct military confrontation in April 2012 in Heglig which only lasted after the international community threatened South Sudanese government to withdraw its troops who had captured the conflicted border area.
The whole Sudanese region and the surrounding areas as I’d argue are unstable. Wars everywhere in the Sudans from East to West and from South to North which leaves the Sudanese people with nothing less than the visible despicable misery. The seemingly irresistible wars in the Sudans have tattered the economies and destabilizing the Eastern African countries, and dragging the region to fight proxy wars of political and economic interests on the Sudanese soil.
The problems of the Sudans as intertwined to their bad past are appalling and to address and stop these problems, the region together with the international community should prudently persuade the two Sudanese administrations to willingly dialog on the most contending issues like demarcation of borders, oil sharing deals and impartially argue the need for viable Sudans that could peacefully co-exist and flourish well without bombs coming into it.
As the wars continue to rag on, the future of the two Sudans remain undefined and the two countries have almost nothing to offer to the world peace, and sadly,world’s political and economic predators are seemingly squeezing out their interests.
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