Can Sudan meet a 30-day deadline to end the political deadlock in Darfur, asks Gamal Nkrumah It is make-or-break for the Sudanese government. Last Friday the United Nations Security Council passed a US-sponsored resolution giving the Sudanese government a 30-day deadline to end the bloody conflict between Sudanese government forces and allied Arab militias known as the Janjaweed on the one hand, and indigenous non-Arab armed opposition groups on the other. If Sudan fails to meet the deadline it will face diplomatic and economic sanctions, and possibly military intervention in the war- torn province of Darfur. The big question is whether Sudan will oblige. The Sudanese government must not now exhibit its by now familiar cynical refusal to own up to the consequences of its policies, one- sided intervention and in some instances inaction, in Darfur. There are signs that the Sudanese government is acquiescing to some of the West's demands. But Sudanese government officials are sending conflicting signals. "The door of jihad is still open, and if it has been closed in the south it will be opened in Darfur," warned the Sudanese armed forces spokesman General Mohamed Beshir Soleiman this week. "Some government officials are posturing and acting as if they can take on the superpowers and challenge the UN resolution, which they claim is an act of war," former Sudanese foreign minister Mansour Khalid told Al-Ahram Weekly. Other officials, he said, are making conciliatory gestures. "This does not help the government's cause," Khalid said. "We are ready to share power and resources in Darfur. We are ready to reach an agreement as we have done in resolving the conflict in southern Sudan," Sudan's Information Minister Al- Zahawi Ibrahim Malik told reporters in Khartoum recently. But Khalid thinks that comparisons cannot be drawn between southern and western Sudan. "In southern Sudan there are religious and cultural dimensions to the conflict. The people of Darfur, Arab and non- Arab, are Muslim. Moreover, there have been traditional claims to separation in southern Sudan, which is not the case in Darfur," he added. Sudanese officials complain that the country's sovereignty is being eroded. At the risk of losing the peace dividend from concluding a deal with the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), some Sudanese officials are speaking of jihad in Darfur. Sudanese President Omar Hassan Al-Beshir's ruling National Congress Party (NCP) must institute constitutional democracy. The UN resolution provides an opportunity for the Sudanese government to make good its pledges of political reform. Sudanese armed forces must not only halt all hostilities in Darfur and end 18 months of counter- insurgency measures in a region the size of France, but it must also disarm and bring to book the Arab Janjaweed militias that helped the Sudanese army quell the uprising in Darfur. Disarming the Janjaweed will not be easy. They are well armed and have close ties with government circles and they share the government's religious zealotry. The African Union's first external contingent of armed troops has arrived in Darfur. The French, meanwhile, are policing the Chadian-Sudanese border. The world is scrutinising steps taken by the Sudanese government to defuse the crisis in Darfur. Last month Sudanese authorities dispatched 6,000 policemen to Darfur and they signalled that they would be increasing the number to 12,000 by the end of August. The US remains unimpressed. Should the Sudanese government fail to reconcile Arab and non-Arab in Darfur, it will be exposed as politically bankrupt as the nation is economically. "They must address the problems that have been simmering for a long time in Darfur such as poverty, underdevelopment and political marginalisation. The people of Darfur want political and economic empowerment," Khalid said. The Sudanese authorities seem increasingly impotent as the situation deteriorates. And the foot- dragging and duplicity have only made the security situation more explosive. In this sense the UN Security Council's resolution was a victory for common sense. Sudan now needs to use its remaining political capital effectively. Khartoum has sensibly promised to disarm the Janjaweed. Sudan sits on a vast reservoir of oil. "There is an external factor, and there are axe-grinders," Khalid said. "But the main dynamic is domestic," he added. The main armed opposition groups in Darfur are the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) affiliated to Al-Turabi's opposition Popular National Congress Party (PNC) and the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA). Both want a bigger say in the running of the affairs of Darfur. Meanwhile, a second conflict is threatening to break out as the Beja people of eastern Sudan begin to take up arms against the Sudanese authorities. With restive outlying regions the centre itself is on the verge of collapse. Can the Sudanese authorities bring order to this chaos? "Khartoum should realise that only through the unbanning of all Sudanese political parties and the lifting of all restrictions on political freedoms does Sudan stand a chance of getting to its own elections, due in three years time according to the Machakos Protocols," says Khalid. But rekindling the spirit of a united Sudan will entail a massive round of reconciliation. The Sudanese government is under tremendous international pressure to cease hostilities in Darfur. The US and the European Union are both determined to see Sudan defuse the crisis in Darfur so that the one million displaced people and refugees return to their homesteads and villages. But it is wrong to pretend that simply pressuring the Sudanese government is a solution when it is by no means clear that the Sudanese authorities are capable of policing their state.
