Message to Sudan from Egypt's first president, Mohamed Naguib

Leafing through old dispatches from Egyptian former President Mohamed Naguib to Sudan offers insight into the present

At a time when Sudan is being partitioned based on creed, political, economic and social reasons, it is appropriate to remember President Mohamed Naguib, Egypt's first president after the 1952 Revolution. Naguib was the first to focus on Sudan in a way worthy of the southern neighbour, but wasn't given an opportunity to accomplish his dreams. Gamal Abdel-Nasser and the other Freedom Officers deposed him for calling for the return of political parties to establish a strong democratic foundation and tradition in Egypt.
Naguib not only took a political interest in Sudan, but also as one of its sons: he spent his childhood, adolescence and early youth there. He scampered across the country at age 16 and became familiar with Khartoum, Om Dorman, Halfa, Dilqo, Senga, Abu Na'ama near Al-Raseres, Wadi Madni and other Sudanese cities. As a result, he became an expert on Sudan, even more so than any native, as they only knew their neighbourhood out of this vast country.
As a boy, Mohamed Naguib's relation to Sudan was deep-rooted, not just as the son of an army officer and Egyptian civil servant in Sudan for various periods, but extending back to his forefathers nearly one century earlier. His bloodline and upbringing formed the character of this young boy and shaped his passion for the Nile Valley and its people, both in the North and South. His family and relatives lived both north and south of the valley, and he wrote letters to Sudan in 1943 when he was a lieutenant colonel in the border guard. In all his correspondence he tried to inform on and campaign for Sudan.
Lieutenant Colonel Naguib, the commander of the second light border vehicle brigade, wrote in a message titled “The Hands of Colonialism on the Borders of Sudan:”
“At the beginning of 1934 I found a map of Sudan hanging on a Dutch ship docked at Al-Tor Port on which some fellow officers and I were invited to visit. It was coloured in the same shade as the rest of the British colonies, including regions which are unequivocally parts of the nation of Sudan.”
“This spurred me to further study the history of these borders and tried my best to raise the alarm with officials about British tactics of laying their hands on territories by colouring regions the same as their colonies and spreading them in world maps until it becomes a reality. I noticed this on several occasions, including when I was a first grade student in 1908 and saw that the colony of Aden was marked on the map with a red circle covering the port. By third grade, I found that a red line had extended a few centimetres east of this area on the map to reach the coast of Hadramaut. At the end of elementary school, this line had stretched until the border of the state of Oman on the Persian Gulf, to include the seven protectorates and others (the Emirates).
“I should not forget to stress that the British have changed the border between Egypt and Sudan repeatedly and the British High Commissioner of Sudan has sometimes had the audacity to make deals with foreign states only as the British representative, without mentioning anything about his mandate in Egypt as the High Commissioner of Sudan, on behalf of both countries.”
“In all this, alterations to the borders of Sudan in the east, west and south are made at the expense of the nations of Sudan and Egypt, especially after European colonial powers agreed at the end of the last century [19th Century] to coordinate their spheres of influence in Africa. Britain's only goal was to achieve its colonialist interests, which resulted in a number of agreements between Great Britain and a number of European countries (Germany, Belgium, France, Italy), which led to carving up many regions in Sudan.
“These agreements prove that Britain has given itself the authority to dispose of Sudanese territories and hand them over to other European countries as part of its colonialist policies of dividing spheres of influence, without any regard to the rights of the Sudanese nation and the opinion of its people. This is what it did in Egypt previously when in it determined Egypt's northeastern border, and also at the western border when it gave up Gaghboub Oasis to Italy and Barth Suleiman Port west of Salloum in 1925.”
In his letter ‘What is happening in Sudan?' Naguib is “surprised that despite the large number of Sudanese citizens in Egypt, we as Egyptians do not bother to ask them about conditions in Sudan or promote ties with them by demonstrating compassion or hospitality towards them. Neither do we take the opportunity that there are a large number of soldiers from the Sudan Defence Force here because of the war, and show hospitality as we did other foreign allied forces.”
“We were even oblivious of their presence amongst us, which is unfortunate. We did not even bother getting to know them, whereby the public would address them as ‘mate' or speak to them in English thinking that they were Indian. The ignorance of the people of Egypt, who are also the sons of the Nile, left a bitter impression with them, although their situation was not oblivious to some citizens, agencies and institutions such as the Agricultural Society, Banque Misr and others.”
“Our reserved position allowed others to swallow up Sudan. The British planned this about one century ago and briefed Gordon when he left London in January, 1882, to remove Egyptians from Sudan and bring its states back under the control of their old rulers in areas such as Kordofan and Darfur. Also, to make Al-Mahdi a sultan over them and Al-Zubair Pacha the ruler of the rest of Sudan. They were able to implement this policy until today, while we remain rooted in our place.”
The question Naguib posed in this message to the Egyptian people, is why are the British keen on appropriating Sudan? He answered with the following reasons:
1- Controlling life in Egypt by controlling Nile waters. Even if we become an industrial state the fuel we have is not enough, and we must use hydroelectricity from the reservoirs from Nile water. He also suspected that the Allied Conference resulted in the division of the world into regions according to production. Egypt grows cotton and wheat and other agricultural products, but we may be partially blocked from industry so that each country or region specialises in a certain type of production.
2- Sudan is a fertile land with rich soil and extensive fields. It is also home to a substantial amount of minerals such as gold and others, as well as forests and animals.
3- To block Islam from spreading to their African colonies to the south.
4- To recruit South Sudan soldiers and annex the South to neighbouring Christian colonies, and establishing a Negro bloc to subjugate the North when the need arises.
5- Because the unity of the Nile Valley makes it a potent power that could obstruct the path of the British Empire. It is the spinal cord for Arab and Muslim states, which reaches as far as the Atlantic Ocean in the West and Malaya and China in the East, and north of the Mediterranean Sea and Asia Minor in the north to South Africa and the eastern Indies in the south.
6- Sudan's strategic value in dominating the Red Sea.
7- Block the spread of communism and other ideologies which could come to Egypt from the East or North, and from there onto its possessions in South or West Africa.
“It was apparent to Great Britain that Sudan's wealth and people were on the rise and its residents were experienced fighters. If they realise maximum strength and revolution, [Britain] would not allow it to achieve glory and dignity in case this wave spreads to neighbouring colonies. In order to keep it under control they must partition it into five or six states and plant the seeds of strife and hatred to weaken it and bring it under their control. They could use the Atlantic Agreement as a pretext, since it describes dividing the world into blocs of countries which are compatible and harmonious. The division was as follows:
1- South Sudan is annexed to Uganda, Kenya and other countries they carved out of the Great Egyptian Empire, to form a Christian Negro bloc to fight the Arabs and Islam. This was evident in their actions in South Sudan since its return in 1898 until today [1949].
2- They could carve out East Sudan [Kasla and Red Sea], which is inhabited by Bega tribes such as Bashariyeen, Hadandowa, Bani Amer and others, and connect it to part of Eritrea and parts of Abyssinia [Ethiopia] where Muslim tribes similar to those in Eritrea and Jala in West Abyssinia live. Some of their officials have actually said as much to several Sudanese leaders, saying that they will incorporate the lower lands in Eritrea, which the Italians call Basso Piano, to the Eastern District. They may have also included the region of Danakala, which stretches along the Red Sea on the border of Sudan until the Port of Assab. The reasons given for this is to bring the tribes living on the border under one administration to prevent divisions.
3- They may partition Kordofan and Darfur. Mohamed Ali Al-Tom, the overseer of the Kababeesh tribes, would rule Kordofan, while the leader of the Rozayqat tribes Ibrahim Moussa Madbu would become the ruler of Darfur.
4- The remainder of Sudan, which stretches until the Nile from the southern border of Egypt until Gabalein (Latitutude 12 degrees North), will have another ruler or be partitioned North of Danqala until the border with Egypt. In that way, it would become another Nubian state and Sudan would be divided into five or six parts, which form a union under their supervision and control. And hence, Sudan would become another India.
“The British will not leave Sudan intact after they trained its citizens on modern warfare, a people who carried out more than 109 revolutions between 1898 until 1924 when they were only using spears and swords. Sudan, with a land mass of nearly one million square miles and nine million residents, has the best and bravest warriors who are fiercely patriotic. Its natural resources make it a force to be reckoned with, and if it joins Egypt it would make the Nile Valley an empire which surpasses the glories of Khedive Ismail's era. It would cross the path of the British Empire and neighbour its colonies, so how could the British allow this?”
“Accordingly, they must first disconnect Sudan from Egypt and then tear Sudan to shreds to make it a second India. After that, they need to instigate animosity and hatred between Egypt and Sudan, and among the different regions of Sudan. It is easy for them to cause fractures since they are the masters of “divide and rule”, the motto they incited the states of the Ottoman Empire to use against the Muslim caliph.
“There are two ways of causing fractures. They could advise Sudan to demand a fee for Nile water, maintenance of reservoirs and compensation for Sudanese territories, which are flooded by the reservoirs and become health hazard swamps for the people. Or they might encourage Sudan to demand that the region of Bashariyeen in southeast Egypt become part of what is known as the administrative border south of the Shalateen Well. Also, they might demand that the Nubian territories in south Aswan become part of Sudan's border, based on the fact that Egypt's southern border – according to an Ottoman Decree on 13 February, 1841 – begins at Point 5 on the Red Sea, partially through South Aswan, until it meets Egypt's western border.”
Despite all the dispatches by Naguib when he was a lieutenant colonel, after he became president he sent a message to the people of Sudan in 1953 saying:
“My brothers and sons across Sudan, I call on every Sudanese citizen to entirely renounce any personal interests or ambitions and only seek public good for his country, and be entirely loyal to his country by carrying out his duty at this critical time in Sudan's history in a manner that pleases God, His prophet and the motherland. Sudan holds the same special place and endearment in my heart and soul as Egypt. I grew up there among my brothers in Sudan, and God knows how relentless I have been in my endeavours while concluding the Sudan Treaty, which recognises the right of the Sudanese people to self-determination. But this treaty is not the end, but a means of national struggle for everyone in Sudan until their country achieves our aspirations for its freedom and dignity.”
“My brothers and sons, you must be very vigilant about the future of your country regardless of your political views and tendencies until, God willing, you are able to free the Sudanese homeland from conquest and colonialism and clench freedom and dignity.”