Briefing: The Uprising in Sudan

Extract

On 7 March 1985, the railway workers of Sudan’s north-eastern town of Atbara took to the streets to protest against the rise in the price of basic foods decreed by the regime of President Jafa’ar Nimeiri.¹ These protests continued for two and a half weeks before the outbreak in Khartoum of the main Intifada, which toppled Nimeiri, his ruling party, and his main state security service. On 19 December 2018, similar protests against rising food prices erupted once again in Atbara, and spread to the rest of the country much more rapidly. As in 1985, these protests have shifted from their early focus on the cost of bread toward a resolutely political emphasis on the toppling of the President Umar al-Bashir and his ruling National Congress Party—hence the slogan ‘tasgut bas’, or ‘just go’. At time of writing, the uprising has lasted just over two months, far longer than those that unseated Sudan’s last two military regimes in 1964 and 1985, which needed just 5 and 11 days, respectively, to bring down the government. It is less Khartoum focused than the previous movements,² as demonstrated by the prominence of the hashtag ‘cities of Sudan rise up (mudun al-Sudan tantafid)’. This not because the previous uprisings did not witness substantial regional revolt, for they certainly did,³ but because the rise of social media activism has enabled dissent to spread from regional cities such as Atbara to Khartoum and elsewhere much more speedily.