13-November-2024

Weekly Press Columns Digest

Weekly Press Columns Digest

KHARTOUM (Sudanow) - Following is a selected summation of press columns tackling the most pressing events of the week. They are: (1) The possibility of a military coup in Sudan, like what happened in Myanmar, in the light of General Burhan’s threats of forming an emergency government to counter the delay in the formation of the new cabinet. (2) The revelations by member of the high committee assigned to retrieve money and properties stolen by the operatives of the Bashir regime that influential government officials have intervened to release Ms. Widad Babikir, wife of ousted President Omar Albashir, who is accused in corruption cases (3) Causes of the continued economic crisis.

Writing in the electronic publication Altahreer (liberation), Mr. Yousif Alsondi has struck a comparison between General Burhan’s warning that he could form an emergency government to overcome the delay in forming the new cabinet and the military coup in Myanmar:

The army has seized power in Myanmar, declaring a one-year state of emergency in the country. This has occurred after the general elections in which party of Myanmar’s President won the majority votes. It is the second general elections after the 2015 elections that followed a protracted military rule. After the 2015 elections, Myanmar shifted to a hybrid democratic system in which power was shared by the civilians and the military.

The system of government in Myanmar before last week’s coup looked like what happens in this transitional period of Sudan: Myanmar’s constitution gave the military a share in government with the elected civilians. The army is represented with a number of seats in the parliament. The army also names occupants of ministries responsible for the security and defense. So it was a hybrid civilian-military regime.

Many in Sudan were for sometime suspicious of the army staging a coup, but given the venturesome nature of the move due to an expected world rejection of military takeovers, they ruled out that possibility. The argument in this is that the world has bypassed the era of military coups.

But what has happened in Myanmar has caused everybody to rethink that possibility and watch the fate of the Myanmar coup when the world, represented in the United Nations, the USA, the EU all of them condemned the coup and called for a return to democratic rule. The United States had warned of imminent sanctions if the country would not return to democratic rule. Such US warnings are good indicators that besiege coup propagators, warning them not to play with fire.

That is the same scenario with which a would-be coup will be faced in the Sudan.

And if the Myanmar coup hasn’t yet been faced with popular protests, a military coup in the Sudan will not escape popular protests, even if it escapes global isolation. Just remember that, coup plotters of Sudan!

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On the release from detention of Bashir’s wife Widad Babikir, wrote Mr. Alfatih Jabra in the daily newspaper Algareeda (the newspaper):

We had thought that Bashir’s wife was under detention in anticipation of her trial after the elementary investigations relating to corruption and unlawful banking dealings are finished.

But this may not be the case, according to what has been revealed by Dr. Salah Manna’a, member of the high committee charged to retrieve stolen government money and properties.

Manna’a had said in a recent televised statement that Ms. Widad was released (so he said) upon personal intervention from General Burhan and his deputy, General Dagalo (Hemaidti).

Certainly, if what Dr. Manna’a had said is true, that would mean a blatant intervention and a gross undermining of the authority of the judiciary.

We have never seen such dictatorial measures except in the times of destruction of the deposed regime.

That matter (if true) is a sign that the defunct regime still rules us with all its power and arrogance through the judicial systems which (we are told) belong to the revolution.

How can she be released, Mr. Attorney General, after all those crimes and that looting which exhausted the country and its people and whose price was paid by hungry children, sick elders and youths whose future was lost and who are barely fighting for daily food.

The crimes committed by this (Widad) qualify her for the harshest of punishments stipulated for such heinous crimes, not protection and impunity.

We have now started to doubt that she had never been detained in the first place, now that it became clear the entire legal order is in the hands of the operatives of the defunct regime: Bashir’s security committee (which is now the Sovereignty Council).

By what right can the Attorney General do all that? Doesn’t he feel ashamed of being a dummy in the hands of these killers, those human blood suckers?

What has been said by Dr. Manna’a is confirmed by the Attorney General’s procrastination in many hot legal cases. Up to now (his highness) did not put any of the criminals of the defunct regime on trial, and we do not even know where they are.

If the fate of the general prosecution is in the hands of these killers, what should we expect?

Why do we keep silent about this plain, provocative conspiracy that compromises the basics of the state of justice and the rule of law?

This conspiracy against justice can shatter what had remained from the revolution, if it hasn’t actually done so. We everyday read about the release of one of the criminals of the defunct regime (the like of Ibrahim Mahmood) who sold the Sudanese nationality in the open market, played with our identity in the worst of ways and stole the country’s riches.

In the news was also the release of Abdelrahman Mohammad Musa, Coordinator of the Popular Defense Forces, that suspicious organization which used to take our young men by force to the war zones in a humiliating manner, when they were captured from the streets without any prior notice, as if they were criminals on the run. They were not even allowed to tell their relatives about what had happened to them. The wounds of the massacre of the Alailafoun cadet camp are still bleeding, bitterly tearing our hearts.

By the discharging of these from detention we should expect more to be discharged, more procrastination on the part of the judicial systems until when all cases face the same fate of the investigations in the Army General Command massacre as planned.

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Discussing what she calls the secret causes of the economic crisis, wrote Ms. Madiha Abdallah chief editor of Almidan newspaper, the mouthpiece of the Sudanese Communist Party:

“More than eighty percent of the money is circulating outside the authorized financial bodies.

Partial talk is made about the security and army commercial companies, without revealing the facts about the interest networks associated with those companies in the world of business and trading transactions.

But the figures are always misleading. The situation on the ground is fearful. It can be seen in the neighborhood grocery and in the public transports where indiscipline is the norm in a manner that sets the livelihoods of citizens into jeopardy.

The foes of the civilian government will not back from suffocating the nucleolus of the civilian state in the Sudan.

We have to choose between confrontation or surrender. There is no third way.

The initial step in this confrontation is for the Prime Minister, with all his political and moral weight, to declare his position towards this enemy, reveal the network of the interests that benefit from this enemy, without hesitation and whatever the consequences.

The attitude towards this enemy should translate into practical steps, not just mere talk.

The government steps to remedy this situation should go further to expose all the economic institutions associated with the mechanisms of that secret market. The interest networks should be exposed and also the sidelining by some government bodies of government revenue. Tax evasions should be brought to book. Smuggling should be countered and also foreign exchange brokers.

For sure, confrontation should include the naming of those interest groups, most of which had been built during the rule of darkness of the defunct regime.

Those benefactors are fighting fiercely in the defense of their interests.

They will not throw the towel, even if this would mean the disintegration of the country.

Countering these evil powers would lead to the rearrangement of the political, social and economic scene and create a degree of cohesion to avoid complete collapse where everybody is the loser.

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YH/AS

 

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