Sudan needs an inclusive transition
The weekend saw the collapse of the regime of General Hassan Omar al-Bashir, Sudan’s long-time ruler. In circumstances that mirror the implosions in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt at the start of this decade, the protests that brought down Bashir started four months ago, triggered by a sharp rise in the cost of living.
Bashir is gone but the future is less certain. Sudan is still in the grip of the military under the leadership of Awad ibn Auf, the former vicepresident and minister of defence under Bashir. Auf’s transitional council has suspended the constitution for three months and announced a two-year transition period. Should they be taken at their word? Until Auf and company can prove
otherwise, their coup against Bashir is likely to be seen as an act of self-preservation by the military and a form of Bashir 2.0.
Sudanese civil society sees the transitional period under military leadership, a state of emergency and the dissolution of parliament, as well as the absence of a plan for transition to civilian rule, as evidence of a divergence of interests between the protesters and their current rulers. Sudan needs both peace and political and economic reform. But without a minimum consensus, it will be difficult to drive that process. A viable transition requires confidence building and political structures need to be quickly substituted by an inclusive interim arrangement.