Weekly Press Columns Digest
05 January, 2020
KHARTOUM (Sudanow)--- Columnist Al-Tahir Satti has criticized a suggestion by the Central Council of the Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC) to the Minister of Finance for delaying removal of subsidies on fuels for six months.
There is no reason for this postponement, said the columnist except that the FFC is thinking of averting anger by, or narcotizing the public not to have the first budget of the Transitional Authority provide for increasing the prices of the basic commodities.
Instead, Satti suggested in his regular column that appeared on Al-Sudani daily newspaper of Saturday that the government establish such bodies as cooperative societies, social solidarity and health-care and student funds to help bring the high cost of living down.
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Writing in Aljareedah daily newspaper of Sunday, Al-Fatih Jabrah opened fire on the Ministry of Finance for granting Al-Fakhir Company for Advanced Enterprises a concession for purchasing and exporting gold and buying the basic imports for the government from the proceeds of that gold.
He said this concession was reminiscent of the principle of the purpose justifies the means, the most notorious principle which legitimizes corruption and favoritism for the purpose of maintaining stability of the state and, according to Jabrah, was applied by the defunct Ingaz regime throughout its rule.
The columnist said he thought that as a result of the glorious December Revolution, the Sudan has got rid of corruption for good but it suddenly reappeared in the person of this Al-Fakhir Company which was announced to take up this tremendous job.
Naming this company without bidding with other companies was corruption in itself as the Ministry of Finance should have followed the fair means of calling bidders to submit tenders for buying and exporting the Sudanese gold and using its proceeds for purchasing the basic government imports, Jabrah said.
Refuting an argument by the government that the company was selected to stabilize the rate of the foreign currencies against the Sudanese pound; the columnist said this could have been done by any company that wins the tender in a fair and honest way.
He called upon the Minister of Finance to cancel the concession forthwith.
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The process of announcing the death verdict of the assassins of martyr Ahmed al-Khair has ended, in fact it was the end of the state of the crime and impunity and the start of the state of justice and law and of subjecting the corrupts, criminals and assassins who have killed many people in cold blood, said Al-Fatih Jabrah in another column published by Aljareedah on Tuesday.
The Sudanese people have the right to welcome the restoration of the state of justice and order, though their joyousness will be completed with the trial of the murderers of the protesters of the General Command sit- in and the punishment of everyone involved in the massacre, said Jabrah.
He said he would have been happier if a death penalty has been issued on the "stupid" Major General (Kassala Police director) who, according to Jabrah, gave a statement that Khair the teacher died of a poisoned breakfast beans meal he shared with security individuals and denied that the victim was beaten or tortured.
The columnist believes that, by giving this lie, the senior police officer must be charged and tried for criminal collusion by trying to offer the culprits a chance of impunity.
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Columnist Shamail al-Nour, in a regular column carried by Altayyar daily newspaper of Monday, wrote about the prospects of moving the present peace negotiations from South Sudan's Juba capital to Khartoum as called by Abdul Wahid Nour of a faction of the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM/AW) who is presently in self-imposed exile in France.
Shamail says Nour, who is reported to have decided to return home finally, is trying to persuade Abdul Aziz al-Hilu of a faction of the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement/ North (SPLM/N) to join his Khartoum initiative that, according to the columnist, is backed by the Sovereignty Council and the Council of Ministers.
She adds that Nour plans to bring the negotiation nearer to the Sudanese media and public opinion and to the internally displaced persons (IDPs) and the refugees who are the main stakeholders, while the initiative is opposed by the other SLM faction of Minni Minawe and Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) of Jibril Ibrahim, which are the main rebel movements in Darfur. The two movements apparently prefer to stay in Juba where a framework peace agreement is about to be signed in Juba, Shamail says.
However, Shamail believes that Nour, by proposing his Khartoum initiative, is planning to thwart the current Juba peace negotiations.
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Ashraf Ibrahim, writing in a column published by Alwatan daily newspaper of Saturday, has remarked that both Prime Minister Abdulla Hamdouk and Sovereignty Council Vice President Mohamed Hamdan Daglo concurred that clandestine hands are behind the bloody incidents in Genainah city, capital of West Darfur State.
The two men, who are leading a high-level delegation on a visit to West Darfur State to find out what is happening there, believe that enemy "opportunists" are working not only in Genainah but elsewhere, including Port Sudan, in the east, for the sole purpose of aborting efforts by the Transitional Authority for achieving the objectives of the December Revolution, particularly peace, the government's top priority, the columnist said.
He further noted that the efforts for checking and investigating the incidents in West Darfur city have provided strong evidence that the civilian and military components of the Transitional Authority are working in concert and close coordination for achieving the ends of the Authority.
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MAS/AS