SUDAN’S ARMY TAKES OVER CIVILIAN GOVERNMENT

▶ Two die in Khartoum unrest after prime minister and Cabinet members are detained

Two protesters were killed and 80 were wounded when Sudanese security forces opened fire on crowds in Khartoum following a military takeover yesterday, the Sudan Doctors’ Committee has said.

Sudan’s military seized power, dismissed the civilian-led government, declared a nationwide emergency and arrested Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and other top officials.

The takeover comes just weeks before the military was supposed to hand the leadership of the council that runs the country over to civilians and more than two years after protesters ousted former president Omar Al Bashir.

In a national TV address, army chief Gen Abdel Fattah Al Burhan said he was dissolving the ruling military-civilian Sovereignty Council he has chaired since its creation in a power-sharing deal in August 2019.

Gen Al Burhan said a government of independent technocrats will be formed to run the country, while the military remains the “guarantor” of the nation’s transition to civilian rule.

Power will be handed over to an elected government following elections in July 2023, he said. He also vowed to shepherd the nation to civilian rule.

He accused political forces of becoming “power hungry”, necessitating the takeover.

“We sensed the grave danger stalking the country,” said the general, who observers say has been showing signs of political ambition.

Jeffrey Feltman, US special envoy for the Horn of Africa, said Washington was “deeply alarmed at reports of a military takeover” of the Sudanese transitional government.

The latest developments threaten “the democratic aspirations of the Sudanese people”, Mr Feltman said yesterday.

Gen Al Burhan paid tribute to the uprising in 2019 that led to the ousting of Al Bashir.

The protests were led by the Forces of Freedom and Change – a pro-democracy alliance that became the political power base of the civilian government and its political patron.

But thousands of people took to the streets yesterday to protest against the coup, burning tyres and chanting slogans.

Pro-democracy activists and “resistance committees” in Khartoum have distributed timetables for street protests over the coming week, with a call for a nationwide demonstration on Saturday.

There were also reports that doctors and teachers plan to go on strike.

“People will go out to the streets and a civil disobedience campaign will begin,” said Sulaima Ishaq, an activist who took part in the 2019 uprising.

“People no longer fear death. In Sudan now, death is no longer a frightening idea, but the military is unable to comprehend that.”

The US embassy in Khartoum called on actors who were disrupting Sudan’s civilian-led transition to stand down, while the EU urged “all stakeholders” and their regional partners to put the democratic transition process back on track.

The coup came after weeks of increasing tension between the military and civilian government, following a failed coup attempt last month that made public long-simmering disputes between the sides.

That quickly turned into mudslinging, with each side blaming the other for the country’s problems.

Residents of Khartoum said thousands of soldiers were stationed across the capital at dawn yesterday and several bridges over the Nile were closed to traffic. They also reported cuts to the internet.

The Information Ministry said soldiers stormed the state radio and TV station in Omdurman, a city north of the capital, and employees were arrested.

Police spokesman Brig Gen Idrees Suleiman told The National that the international airport in Khartoum was closed to traffic and the city was paralysed.

Mr Feltman was in Sudan at the weekend to meet officials including Gen Al Burhan after saying the collapse of the transition could jeopardise the arrival of US aid.

Sudan’s political landscape has been defined by military coups since it became independent 65 years ago.

At the weekend, the FFC said it suspected Gen Al Burhan wanted Mr Hamdok’s Cabinet to be replaced with a government that gave the military the final word on policies.

The group said the military was behind a month-long blockade of a commercial port on the Red Sea that has caused shortages of bread.

Hundreds of thousands held marches across the country last Thursday to show their support for Mr Hamdok’s government.

The military sealed off its headquarters with concrete barriers.