Sudan... Peaceful Revolutions and a Relentless Military Institution
Yousef Hamad
Despite the large-scale war in the country since last April, the Sudanese will celebrate today, October 21, 59 years since one of the greatest and earliest peaceful revolutions of modern times in the region: the October 1964 revolution that overthrew the countrys first military government led by General Ibrahim Abboud.
The tactics of the October Revolution and its political and social objectives remained pride and were written around by many literary and intellectual narratives, even though they were aborted early in life, by a military coup led by Jaafar Nimiri in May 1969, and represented a 16-year anti-revolutionary action.
Celebrations in October are not expected to be carnival in public streets, owing to the intense restriction imposed by the belligerents, the military and rapid support, on collective civilian activity. In this regard, there have been several violations of the prohibition of freedom of expression and of war-advocating gatherings, at least in the countrys central and Port Sudan, in the east and Sinja, in the south-east.
Nevertheless, the Sudanese have been able to declare an anti-war political stream, the Broad Front for the Restoration of Democracy, made up of several political parties, trade unions and organizations active in civic action. This is in itself a revolutionary act that is aware of the importance of democracy and peaceful political action and relies heavily on it to lift the country out of an ominous fate.
In the midst of this civic action, the Sudanese will revive the early modern revolution, thanks to the creation of a modern revolutionary consciousness that once again gave birth to the sons in 1985 and overthrew the regime of Jaafar Nimiri, which hindered its natural development. This awareness also took place in December 2018 through the broad-based peaceful revolution led by grandchildren and ended the dictatorship of Omar al-Bashir and the Muslim Brotherhood, which had dominated the country for 30 years.
In fact, the revolution was not new for the Sudanese, since the countrys independence in 1956, they have led three revolutions in the years 1964, 1985, 2018, and their enemy has always been the military institution attached to democracy and the civilian practice of politics.
Prior to that, they knew revolutions against colonialism and authoritarian regimes, suggesting that each father and his children participated separately in a revolution of revolts: 1885, 1924, 1956, as well as 1964, 1985, 2018. It does not seem that the Sudanese will cease this practice.
