AC Vol 43 No 15
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www.africa-confidential.com 26 July 2002 Vol 43 No 15 AFRICA CONFIDENTIAL ZIMBABWE 3 SUDAN After the phoney war The economic crisis may just force Calling the shots at Machakos President Robert Mugabe to stand Arch manipulation of American and British peacemakers buys the down at the ruling ZANU-PF’s NIF another six and a half years’ time annual conference in December. ‘Breakthrough on peace!’ shout the headlines. ‘It’s a sham, it won’t work!’ protest the National Islamic Rival factions are lining up behind Parliament’s Speaker, Emmerson Front’s opponents. Five weeks of closed-door discussions at Machakos, Kenya, between the NIF Mnangagwa, and a smaller group government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement, ended on 20 July. The talks, under the of ZANU-PF reformers behind auspices of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), produced a protocol of Finance Minister Simba Makoni. understanding and an agreement to reconvene at the Machakos Garden Hotel on 12 August. The enthusiasm came almost entirely from the government side. Its team, led by presidential Peace KENYA 4Advisor Ghazi Salah el Din el Atabani, a core NIF man, talked as if peace already reigned. The SPLA/M delegation, led by Colonel John Garang de Mabior’s deputy, Commander Salva Kiir Uhuru now! Mayardit, was far less effusive, with good reason. Chaired by Kenya, overseen by Eritrea, Ethiopia and Uganda and driven (in top gear) by Britain and the United States, the talks were heavily weighted Uhuru Kenyatta has a lot of supporters for his bid for the in the Sudan government’s favour. Southerners say this looks like the usual sell-out; the northern presidency, including President opposition says the process further entrenches the regime, giving it the international blessing which oil Daniel arap Moi. But his opponents wealth had not quite managed to buy. include former opposition politician The diplomatic, often woolly, sometimes contradictory language of the Machakos Protocol of 20 July Raila Odinga, who joined KANU in must be read between the lines. The main message is ‘divide to rule’. The conflict is portrayed purely the hope of getting the job himself. in north-south terms and, since there is no insistence on democracy or human rights in the north, the government is treated as the only interested northern party. If it implemented democratisation, the regime SOUTH AFRICA 6 would sign its own death warrant – so the northern Sudanese majority is left out, as are southern parties other than the SPLA/M. Buthelezi replays history Self-determination still out of reach The Protocol says resolution of the conflict will be based on the Declaration of Principles signed by the Relations between the ANC and Inkatha are at their worst since SPLA in July 1994 and, reluctantly, by the NIF in July 1997. The DOP’s key clauses propose the before the 1994 elections. With separation of state and religion in the south and a referendum there on self-determination. the parties’ alliance under threat, These principles were also the basis of the opposition National Democratic Alliance’s crucial Asmara the ANC is seeking a way to Declaration of 1995. The NDA is mainly northern, but the SPLA is a member and most of its troops are extricate Buthelezi from his southern. Yet before Machakos, the NIF was claiming it had signed the DOP only as a basis for discussion kwaZulu-Natal politics, but the Zulu leader has plenty of cards up his and Ghazi Salah el Din declared that no Sudanese government would accept the separation of religion sleeve. and state. This was designed to appeal to the religion-based Umma and Democratic Unionist parties, both of which signed the Asmara Declaration but uphold Islamic law, albeit not the NIF version. It ignores GHANA 7 Sudan’s secular parties, whose role in national life is greater than their numbers. The nation had a secular I’m Sam, fly me criminal code until 1983, when President Ja’afar Mohamed Nimeiri brought in the ‘September Laws’. Machakos stipulates Sharia (Islamic civil and criminal law) in the north, secular law in the south – not With the demise of Air Afrique, what the DOP says at all. Ghana Airways ought to be A sentence in the signatories’ 20 July joint statement encapsulates the other key issues: ‘The parties booming. Instead, the company is paralysed by political concerns – agreed that a peaceful and just resolution based on the unity of the Sudan is their common objective and and has just lost its Chairman, Sam that a military solution is neither viable nor desirable’. This commits neither side to much. The SPLA Jonah. still officially fights for a united Sudan, as the southern clamour for independence swells to a roar. Most northern Sudanese, even those who support the SPLA, oppose breaking up the country. The government POINTERS 8 clearly has no intention of losing control of the oil reserves, almost all in the south, and sees the south as its future breadbasket and Islamist springboard into Africa. Morocco/Spain, Western peacemakers say neither side can win. Combatants see it differently. The SPLA has improved its military capability this year. Garang, Commander in Chief of the SPLA and NDA, repeats that the Uganda & Zambia conflict can be resolved only after the NIF is overthrown (a refrain he took to the USA this year, though Everyone likes parsley; Henry’s few in George Bush’s government appear to have listened). In late June,when a draft of the Machakos parachute; and no immunity. Protocol leaked out, southern ‘civil society’ groups rejected its proposals, while SPLA commanders, we hear, said there would ‘be blood’ if leaders went ahead with it. After the signing, a senior SPLA official told us the war would never end until the rebels got what they wanted. He did not mean national unity. 26 July 2002 Africa Confidential Vol 43 No 15 Who is Sulaf? Hot on the heels of the Machakos Protocol signed in Kenya on 20 July, we put it into action”.’ It also quotes him as saying that ‘“more than 50 or Relationships Foundation International held its own fifth round of peace even 60 per cent of its [the government’s] budget is spent on the war”.’ talks from 22 July in Britain. The UK-based RFI initiative, which enjoys Sources recall that since his youth, Sulaf el Din encouraged friends and some funding from, inter alia, the United States Agency for International family to join the NIF (then called the Muslim Brotherhood). He had little Development (USAID), is presided over by a Kenyan former Finance success in his tribe: the Halfawi Nubians (from the extreme north around Minister and Luo leader, Professor Washington Okumu (AC Vol 42 No Wadi Halfa on the Egyptian border) have a strong secularist tradition. 15). Its approach is to bring Sudanese leaders together on a personal basis: Sulaf continued as an Islamist activist. Like other leading government they are not supposed to attend the closed-door, Chatham House rules, members, he was active in the NIF’s 30 June 1989 coup d’état. He has meetings as representatives of parties or other organisations but as excellent links to security and to aid agencies, in which he has long had a individuals. This is common conflict resolution practice but ignores the special interest. He became HAC in 1999 and has become increasingly fact that Sudanese leaders have never had any difficulty in talking: it’s prominent. what they mean that matters. And the NIF can monitor the whole process. He is especially outspoken about government flight bans, over which This week’s meeting saw some interesting people closeted in Stevenage. the United Nations’ Operation Lifeline Sudan regularly protests. This One guest who should feel at home in the Home Counties since he has a April, the UN complained that Khartoum had increased the number of Food Science Doctorate from Reading University (on the dehydration of ‘denied locations’ for the second month running. ‘...flights are carried out leafy vegetables) is Sudan’s Humanitarian Affairs Commissioner, Sulaf el to positions unknown to us, exposing humanitarian aid workers and Din Salih Mohamed Tahir. His trip to Hertfordshire was delayed by a possessions to danger’, Sulaf was quoted as saying. ‘The failure by the UN visit to British Development Secretary Clare Short. As HAC, Sulaf el Din to respond to these requirements may make us withdraw our facilitation to Salih oversees all relief aid to the south (see Feature) and speaks frequently a reasonable level’. in the name of the National Islamic Front government. The Courier This followed February’s helicopter gunship attack on villagers awaiting newsletter of the African-Caribbean-Pacific-European Union, wrote in a UN World Food Programme delivery. The denial of access was ‘a November 2001: ‘The Commissioner is open about his beliefs. “We like violation of the humanitarian principles and the tripartite agreement under to link our humanitarian activities with our faith and quote the Koran when which the OLS was created in 1989’, said the WFP. Khartoum’s arsenal is growing faster. The military-industrial since publicly disagreed about whether they had agreed that the complex known as Giad (whose civilian part is owned by Salah Idriss, federal constitution should be Islamic. Demobilisation is another owner of El Shifa factory) is assembling weapons and tanks based on destabiliser. SPLA troops may vote with their guns if they disagree the Russian T55 and T72. Models named after President Omer with their leaders and the NIF might not welcome home an army that Hassan Ahmed el Beshir and the late Vice-President Zubeir Mohamed feels it has been sold out.