CHECKMATE

By Bushara Ahmed Gumaa, President of Darfur's Friends Association (DFA)
September, 20, 2005

AL-INTIKAS' (the setback) regime is accustomed to use the art of haggling, moving the “ball” of power from one party to another, “inviting” the opposition parties to share power with it. This tactic was used by the regime to defeat The National Democratic Alliance (NDA). The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has knelt down to the dictator Omar Al-Bashir’s team and accepted all what it has rejected before. I don’t know why it did it. Maybe it has lost its dignity or perhaps it’s an act of opportunism. Any way, the piece of power’s cake that’s got it is so miserable; it could not change the regime’s policy and its deputies will only be useful to applaud the dictator’s speech. Moreover, it will loose popularity among its voters in future elections, when real democracy comes, after the disappearance of AL-INTIKAS regime.

However, the SPLM/A has chosen a difficult sport to compete against the regime. It has chosen a chess game that’s been celebrated in Naivasha (Kenya). Its senior player Dr. John Garang was “playing” against the dictator Omar Al-Bashir´s right “hand”, Ali Mohamed Taha. The game was very boring; they were playing for almost two years and at the end the SPLM/A won clearly, but the dictator and his followers has celebrated it as a big triumph, saying that both have won the game (drawn). In fact, AL-INTIKAS' dictatorial regime had sufficient reasons to be satisfied: Naivasha allowed it to remain in power at least three years more and gives it 52 % of the parliament’s seats. But the SPLM/A, the real winner, has the possibility to create a new state in southern Sudan, if the majority of the southerners decide to do so, within six years.

Suddenly, the most charismatic SPLM/A “player”, Dr. John Garang disappears, due to a tragic air crash. Then, a little known “player”, general Salva Kiir has replaced him as a principal player for the second round of the chess game that took place in Khartoum. The regime of the dictator Omar Al-Bashir was sure that it’ll win this time. However, the new player has surprised all observers when he moved the issue of energy and mining ministry, and announced “checkmate”. Now the regime is very nervous because it doesn’t know how to solve this challenge! But, is it really checkmate or general Salva Kiir is just talking and he’s really a junior player?

In the coming days we’ll see the consequences of this dispute. Now we could suppose the following scenarios:

- Suppose that the regime’s accepted to loose the game, giving the disputed ministry to the SPLM/A. Then all dirty work of the regime related with oil concessions and corruption will come out. But this scenario is not probable, unless, the regime has already cleaned up its dustbin from the ministry. However, this option is very dangerous for it, because it will anger its supporters and especially its parasites, those who get a lot of economical benefits from the regime during decades (pro-governmental news papers, some opportunists journalists who kneel down to the dictator and shamefully they always defend him and treat him like their master, and some innocent religious people who believe that Al-Bashir´s regime is governing according to Shari’a Law).

- Suppose that the regime and the SPLM/A are going to share the disputed ministry or they’ll divided it into two. In this case, sooner or later there will be other disputes: some kind of problems related with their competences in these new ministries will rise. Since, the country’s economy depends principally on oil revenues and a major part of oil production comes from southern Sudan.

- Suppose that the regime and the SPLM/A couldn’t reach any agreement and IGAD´s mediators reopen Naivasha´s doors again. This will be a very bad signal and the country’s future will be unpredictable.

- Suppose that there isn’t any checkmate and general Salva Kiir was just talking, because he’s really a junior player. Then the SPLM/A will face internal disputes in future.

All these difficulties and propagation of distrust are taking place before the national “unity” government’s been formed. So, what would happen when they have to solve the problem of Abyei and other more complicated issues? I think we’ll face big challenges in the coming months or years. Because the CPA is so fragile and its a bilateral agreement that has been signed only by the AL-INTIKAS regime and the SPLM/A. It’s marginalised all the opposition forces and gives the signatures all kind of privileges.

Moreover, if Darfur rebels continue their internal disputes, the situation in Darfur will be very complicated and there will not be real peace in the whole country. There’ll be different negotiators and different rebel groups that claim legitimacy to talk on behalf of their ethnic groups. Ethnicity is the worst problem, even though, some short mind of AL-INTIKAS regime are fomenting it and thinking that this way it would be easy for them to control the country and remain in power the longest time possible. Acting as the master of Sudan and holding endless negotiations in different parts of the country.

Unfortunately, there’re some opportunists political parties who just worry about their quota to share power with the dictator Omar Al-Bashir. They’ve forgot slogans that they’ve used for years demanding real democracy for whole the nation. Now they use other slogans to confuse their voters saying that joining the regime is good for peace, in fact, it’s just serve their own personal interests, but it’s very bad for the nation. A real democracy only comes through free elections.

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