Sudan Takayas inspired relief providers and aid distribution organizations
Quoted from New Horizon
Over the past two years, international organizations such as the United Nations and the World Health Organization, as well as numerous human rights groups, have drawn attention to the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Sudan. The numbers are staggering; more than 25 million people face food insecurity, 10 million people have been displaced, and more than 600,000 people are suffering from catastrophic levels of hunger.
The crisis can largely be traced back to the ongoing civil war that began in early 2023, which has created significant obstacles to the entry and distribution of international aid. Aid shipments face arbitrary and indefinite delays at ports controlled by the Sudanese Armed Forces. When aid shipments do enter the country, they are often targeted, hijacked, and looted by the Rapid Support Forces and their affiliated militias. In other words, international aid is not reaching its intended beneficiaries. With the Trump administration’s recent efforts to close USAID, the situation is likely to get worse.
Despite these obstacles, communities in Sudan have banded together to form volunteer-based mutual aid networks, called emergency rooms, to distribute vital supplies and resources to vulnerable populations. Examples include community kitchens and tekayas in areas particularly affected by severe hunger, as well as medical clinics or centers that help women deal with sexual violence.
Civil agency has increasingly been recognized in wartime settings, with academic studies examining how social cohesion and cooperation can help people protect themselves and those around them.
These rooms and tekayas offer an example of what a different model for aid distribution could look like.
Current aid models prioritize top-down infrastructure. Individual states contribute funds or international organizations—primarily the United Nations—raise them through mass appeals, which then collaborate with larger international organizations and sometimes smaller civil society organizations to deliver aid in the midst of conflict. As a supposedly neutral actor, the warring factions can allow UN agencies to deliver supplies through humanitarian corridors, although aid access to opposition-held areas can still be restricted. This was the case before in Syria, where the government of former President Bashar al-Assad prevented UN agencies from delivering aid to opposition-held areas. This situation required the UN Security Council in 2014 to develop a special cross-border mechanism to allow aid into Idlib. A similar problem arose in Sudan, where the Sudanese Armed Forces prevented UN agencies from delivering aid to Darfur, which is controlled by the Rapid Support Forces. The enormous challenge of delivering aid to Gaza since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas has also been well documented, with Israeli obstructions and delays resulting in a catastrophic humanitarian situation for Palestinians over the course of 16 months of fighting. The potential for aid diversion is also high. For example, the Assad regime in Syria has diverted aid to various patronage networks rather than allowing resources to flow to vulnerable populations.
A 2022 report estimated that between 40 and 60 percent of all aid was diverted to Assad’s intelligence services and armed forces as primary beneficiaries.
In Sudan, the Sudanese Armed Forces have used the Humanitarian Aid Commission, a brutal institution from the days of former dictator Omar al-Bashir, to confiscate aid shipments and distribute the goods to their own patronage networks.
At the same time, looting, particularly by the Rapid Support Forces, has become more widespread amid increasingly desperate conditions.
Months after the war broke out, reports emerged that RSF fighters looted a UNICEF aid convoy, despite initial denials by UN officials.
More recently, RSF fighters were also accused of looting more than 7,000 tons of World Food Programme food shipments bound for North Darfur state. Instead, the goods were reassigned to the RSF-controlled city of Nyala.
In contrast, mutual aid networks in Sudan operate on a volunteer basis from local communities.
Before the war, many of these networks also operated as neighborhood resistance committees, mobilizing against Bashir in late 2018 and again against the architects of the military coup in 2021. When the war began, the resistance committees quickly rebranded themselves as emergency rooms to address local needs.
Their fundraising efforts also depart from the traditional model of relying solely on individual countries or international organizations. Instead, funding is primarily provided by Sudanese citizens themselves and the diaspora, although any interested individual can donate directly. This direct funding stream allows aid to flow more efficiently than traditional models, as a dollar donated is a dollar that directly benefits someone on the ground.
It is important to note that local relief groups are not necessarily unique to Sudan. Colombia’s decades-long conflict involving multiple armed groups has left at least 260,000 people dead, more than 80 percent of them civilians. Some grassroots groups have been able to negotiate with the ELN, FARC, and other right-wing paramilitaries to protect themselves and their communities from violence, kidnapping, and extortion.
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By Kelsey Norman, Middle East Fellow and Director of the Women’s, Human Rights, and Refugee Program at Rice University’s Baker Institute, and Salah Ben Hamou, Postdoctoral Research Associate at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy
