The Sudan impasse 2023-2025: prospects for ‘normal politics’?

For almost two years, Sudan has seen a devastating armed conflict, massive suffering of the population, large-scale food insecurity, and deep humanitarian problems. Since independence in 1956 this diverse and fractured country did not succeed in creating a stable, inclusive or even functional state structure for its citizens, and the current conflict makes this painfully clear.

The ongoing war is shocking in its cynic and abject violence and shows major institutional failure of the state. The significant destruction of country and people is carried out by self-appointed elites who see no need or reason to show accountability to Sudan’s citizens. Periods of calm and hope in earlier years, and a couple of relatively promising election rounds held in the 1970s-1980s, are overshadowed by recurring armed conflict. The ‘politics’ of the two military actors claiming all political space do not recognise the sovereignty of the population at large. Politics are now entirely securitised and marked by a de facto state of emergency across most of the country: no ‘normal politics’ - in the sense of a political playing field or arena with shared procedural rules and where recourse to violence as political means is pre-empted  is visible. A culture of violence has conditioned the political strategies and mindsets in place.

Arbitrarily determined entity
One might go back in history and say that this is again partly related to the very diverse, divided, unequal and ‘arbitrarily determined’ entity that is Sudan - not helped by Egyptian-British overlordship since 1898, and, as the late Ali Mazrui once noted, marked by ‘multiple marginality’ (as to identity, regional and population composition, political status, its presumed ‘Arab’ character, etc.). Governance and stable state-building in Sudan have always had serious defects, due indeed to a combination of inequality, problematic diversity, exploitation, and power abuse, together with the legacies of problematic and autocratic-colonial Egyptian-British rule over the country.

Double tyranny 
What is the state of affairs now? Since April 2023 Sudan suffers under a double tyranny: that of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The SAF are the national army representing the state regime rooted in the three Arab peoples/‘tribes’ in the central Sudan triangle (Ja’aliyyin, Danagla, and Shaiqiyya). The RSF, an additional militia put in place by the Omar al-Bashir regime, is from the Arabised peoples of parts of west Darfur and west-central Sudan: e.g., Rizeigat, Messiriya, Beni-Halba, Tarjam and Al-Ta’isha, and has partly its roots in the Janjaweed militias that wrought havoc in Darfur since 2003. The split between these two armed forces today also reflects earlier oppositions within Sudanese society/societies dating from the late 19^th century (the ‘Mahdiyya effect’) and also problems of resource competition, contested migration patterns, and effects of high population growth. And many groups took to militant self-defence - it is estimated that one in every 4-5 Sudanese has a firearm. Neither of the two groups (SAF and RSF) has solid majority support among the population. But they both actively recruit, sometimes under coercion, various tribal and ethno-regional groups into their ranks.

Human toll
As of December 2024 the war’s human toll according to some estimates (New York Times) is ca. 150,000 people killed or died of famine, with ca. 61,000 in Khartoum State alone. There are reports of gross abuse of civilian populations by both sides. Almost 25 million people - more than half of Sudan’s population of 49 million - are in serious humanitarian need. Furthermore, the displaced people counted around ca. 12 million by November 2024. Over 10 million of these remain within Sudan, representing the largest displacement crisis in the world. Over 2 million fled to neighbouring countries - 600,000 in Chad. There is also widespread destruction of the country’s infrastructure, including schools, universities, and hospitals, and government facilities, e.g., more than 70% of health facilities in conflict-affected regions are inoperable or closed. Also rampant looting (especially by RSF forces) has been observed. The killing and ethnic cleansing of people in many areas led to huge displacement (again, notably in Darfur) and when intended to be permanent it is likely counted as a war crime under international law. Also seen is a lot of gender-based violence and disempowerment of women (who were a big force in the 2019 revolts). All these acts of violence aggravated conditions in a country that was already in deep crisis before the April 2023 war started.

Dashed memory of hope
The April 2019 popular revolt, after which the then-President Omar al-Bashir - probably the worst leader Sudan ever had in terms of the dismal economic record, the political instability and devastating conflicts under his 30-year rule - was overthrown, leading to an insecure political transition, is a distant and dashed memory of hope. The civilian-transitional government then installed was frustrated by the army, that had ultimately remained in control and reasserted itself in October 2021: the admittedly confused and uncertain political transition period led by civilian prime minister Abdallah Hamdok, was ended by the coup d’état of SAF general A. al-Burhan, then supported by the RSF.

The current so-called ‘generals’ war’ is a breakdown of the state and of the political order. Popular resistance or rebellion against this war between SAF and RSF is of course easier said than done, because the warring elites have not only pushed the general population into survival mode but also made civic political action quite impossible.

Sudan has seen this before: civil wars, elite fighting, conflicts between all kinds of groups, bad state of the economy, generalised insecurity, gender-based violence, etc. One serious problem is that there are no good role models of civilian rule or strong institutions beyond the military actors: the periods of parliamentary or civilian-led politics in Sudan (1956-58; 1964-69; 1986-89 and 2019-21), were not very successful. The armed actors SAF and RSF are the only relatively well-organised power blocks, against which other social and political forces are powerless. The two are also economically entrenched in a predatory economy. They steamrollered over and marginalised urban middle classes, workers, rural farming communities, and other political forces like the Sudan Professionals’ Association, the Women of the Sudanese Civic and Political Groups (MANSAM), or the wider alliance FFC (Forces of Freedom and Change, active especially in 2019), the trade unions, ethnic-regional groups in the peripheries, and even parts of the Muslim religious establishment – although the latter were a significant part of the problem in the pre-2019 era.

Institutionalised civilian rule needed
As long as the two armed groups are rooted in violent, exploitative ‘neo-patrimonial’ economic practices, they will be difficult to dislodge or hold accountable. Perhaps only war fatigue and dwindling resources (and perhaps external pressure) will lead to an end of the war. Or to a kind of ‘victory’ for one of them. But no problems will be solved by this if a new and inclusive political dispensation is not found that paves the way for institutionalised civilian rule. In such a future dispensation, the fighting armies would of course have to be brought under civilian structures, and perhaps a price has to be paid for this in terms of the post-war pursuit of justice: it will be precarious and difficult to bring the culprits and perpetrators of the massive violence to trial, and justice may have to ‘wait’.

Also the role of politicised religion is better reduced in a future constitutional formula and in political practice (see below). In the Al-Bashir era (and already before, in the 1960s to 1980s), Islamism and Arabism, coupled with elite authoritarianism, were forced upon the Sudanese people in a particular form and shape - fed by the Islamist NIF-party (founded in 1976), in league with O. al Bashir, in power after a military coup d’état in 1989. Their policies did great damage to Sudan, causing deep instability, violence and economic malaise. This Islamism-Arabism agenda already emerged under the first military regime after Sudan’s independence, led by general I. Abboud since his 1958 coup d’état. Of course Islam is an important element of Sudan’s identity - or rather, of many of its peoples- but that does not mean that it has to be the defining political-constitutional foundation of the state itself.

Subversive foreign interference
After almost two years of fighting since April 2023, Sudan’s impasse is hard to break. It is also maintained by subversive foreign interference via a complex web of international actors on both sides, e.g., the SAF supported by Iran and Egypt; and RSF by UAE and Russia. Both armies showed resistance to mediation, even from the AU and neighbouring countries like Egypt and Ethiopia. Mediation might initially come from more or less neutral domestic forces without a stake in either armed party and who could start to build a piece-meal process of hands-on negotiation on practical not ideological or power issues (yet). These efforts could be financed/facilitated by an external donor consortium, within the African Union framework.

Such a normalisation/stabilisation process must make a serious connection between the Sudanese local regional-ethnic communities and the armed actors/elites. Otherwise no durable road to peace will be found. At present, an ‘elite deal - i.e., where the fighting elites/warlords are ‘rewarded’ or appeased again with a political agreement that gives them power and positions – will perpetuate instability. A so-called pragmatic ‘power-sharing’ formula with the usual suspects will not solve anything.

The international community has often been superficial, non-committal or indifferent in its dealings with Sudan, partly out of (alleged) lack of funds and lack of prospects or ideas on a strategy. And it has made major mistakes, perhaps out of confusion or despair. For example, it was probably wrong to end the mandate of the AU-United Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur (UNAMID) in December 2020 - and Sudan’s transitional government handed over all UNAMID bases in Darfur to the RSF.

Things that might help
In the process of seeking a way out of the current conflict landscape, some things might help:

1. De-emphasise religious politics (the slogan of 2018-2019 popular civic protests was: ‘Madaniyya!’ – i.e., a civil or secular administration). That means that constitutional change is needed;

2. Work towards fundamental (institutional) recognition of the country’s diversity and its shared political interests, e.g. initially respect all parties’ stakes in the negotiations and halt the fighting step by step (not ‘instrumentalise’/exploit them). Again, this cannot be enforced, except - if one wishes - by externally imposed law-and order initiatives, but that will in the short term make things that we see now even worse… And there is always the risk of Sudan fragmenting into smaller, semi-independent political units. That would enhance the instability;

3. A new, innovative but radical form of regional (not ethnic) federalism is an option to pursue, preferably with more economic justice (i.e., a more level playing field) to be realised; 4. A longer-term international economic reconstruction plan for the entire country, with stakes for all. Donor countries can play a role here; however, while tempering their political ambitions and direct interference in Sudan.

No easy solution
In Sudan we have seen state failure, elite failure, durable armed conflict due to violence used as political means, and not political-economic governance but predatory economies exploiting/endangering the common people. All challenges with no easy solution. And ‘solutions’ will perhaps not even be possible: one can perhaps only reach political and economic agreement with the least negative trade-offs. Let us at least hope for those, so that Sudan’s people can work towards a gradual reconstitution of state and society.

Photo credit: Screengrab from VOA's video Number of Refugees Who Fled Sudan for Chad Double in Week. This is a refugee camp in Chad, 16 May 2023. Henry Wilkins/VOA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Map of Sudan: Adobe Stock

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