The Sudanese military’s power grab, in which a junta led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan forcibly sidelined prime minister Abdalla Hamdok and the civilian half of Sudan’s transitional government last week, has upended one of Africa’s most promising democratic transitions. The civil society groups who led the 2019 revolution against former strongman Omar al-Bashir have not taken the move lying down, launching street demonstrations despite a crackdown that has killed over ten protestors, writes Colin Stevens in EU Reporter.
The coup threatens to plunge Sudan into not just political but also economic chaos. The transitional government’s Western partners have been put on the back foot, with the United States and the World Bank suspending aid less than six months after French president Emmanuel Macron’s “International conference to support the Sudanese transition” saw Hamdok secure a $1.5 billion loan and $5bn in debt relief.
The European Union, for whom the stability of Sudan represents a major foreign policy issue, is now under pressure to impose consequences on the junta beyond its rhetorical condemnation. The takeover represents an equally vexing challenge for Khartoum’s neighbours, and for institutions like the African Union (AU).
Led by Congolese president Félix Tshisekedi, the AU has suspended Sudan’s participation in the body “until the effective restoration of the civilian-led transitional authority.” Neighbouring states such as Chad, a key EU partner where the transitional government of Mahamat Idriss Déby faces a “Herculean” task in securing its borders with countries including Sudan, are also keeping a wary eye on events in Khartoum.
With Tshisekedi in the lead, African Union suspends Sudan’s membership
The African Union’s decision to suspend Sudan came quickly after the coup and crystallized a wave of international condemnation. In its statement on the events in Khartoum, the Peace and Security Council of the AU made clear it “totally rejects the unconstitutional change of government” and warned the Sudanese military its actions threaten “to derail the progress made in the Sudanese transitional process… plunging the country back into a cycle of violence.”
Félix Tshisekedi, who has presided over the AU since February, has personal experience in securing peaceful transfers of power. The son of long-time Congolese opposition leader Étienne Tshisekedi, who endured both exile and house arrest as a critic of successive autocratic regimes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Félix rose to the presidency in 2019 after former president Joseph Kabila’s nearly two decades in office.
Tshisekedi’s presidency, in addition to representing the DRC’s first peaceful transfer of power since independence in 1960, has also illustrated the types of benefits long-isolated countries like Sudan can aspire to by embarking on a serious democratic transition.
After finally securing the necessary support in the Congolese parliament earlier this year, Tshisekedi has embarked on an ambitious reform programme that has secured the backing of his political rivals as well as international bodies like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. Reflecting a desire for change, Tshisekedi’s nominee for prime minister was ushered into office this past April by a nearly unanimous parliamentary vote – a development welcomed by the EU and member states including France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands.
Recognizing, like Sudan’s Abdalla Hamdok, that international backing is critical for realizing the ambitions of the Congolese democratic movement, Tshisekedi has started rebuilding the DRC’s frayed diplomatic relationships with Europe, where he attended the G20 summit in Rome last week and spoke at the COP26 in Glasgow this past Tuesday.
Chad’s alternative example
While the DRC may offer the Sudanese democracy movement a template for the future, neighbouring Chad represents an example of how African military leaders can head off crises without jeopardizing their country’s place in the international community. Burhan’s claims to be carrying out his coup to preserve Sudan’s stability have been widely rejected, but leaders in Chad faced the real possibility their country could fall apart after the battlefield death of president Idriss Déby this past April.
As a key partner of French and European forces operating across the Sahel, the Chadian army has set itself apart as by far the most effective of Europe’s G5 Sahel allies. After the late president Déby’s death, however, the possibility that Chad’s central government could collapse – taking with it the architecture of Western and African counterterrorism operations across the region – was averted by a transitional military council (TMC) led by his son, Mahamat Idriss Déby. Reflecting the close security relationship between Chad and Europe, French president Emmanuel Macron and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell attended the senior Déby’s funeral in N’Djamena.
In contrast to Sudan’s top brass, who have held power since Bashir’s ouster in 2019 and staged their coup just before handing over control to their civilian counterparts, Chad’s TMC responded to calls by its Western allies by naming a civilian transitional government just two weeks after the former president’s death. In a next step towards full civilian rule, Chad inaugurated a transitional parliament in early October, including a number of opponents of the former regime. Starting this month, Chadian transitional authorities will also embark upon a long-awaited national dialogue that will include rebel groups and is intended to set the stage for presidential and legislative elections.
In Khartoum, by contrast, the new junta – which includes notorious Janjaweed militia leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo – is almost certain to derail the diplomatic inroads Hamdok had made with the largest insurgent movements in Sudan. Renewed violence on the Sudanese periphery, and especially the Darfur region that borders Chad, would have serious implications for the government in N’Djamena, especially as pro-government Sudanese militias have been known to draw recruits from Chadian rebel factions.
Forming a united front
As the European Union struggles to formulate its response to the events in Sudan, it will need to leverage its relationships with these and other African actors to generate enough diplomatic pressure to force the Sudanese military to backtrack. While the Sudanese coup leaders allegedly enjoy support from influential corners of the Arab world, that does not make them immune to concerted diplomatic pressure from Sudan’s neighbours and its African and Western counterparts more broadly.
By reinforcing the position of the Sudanese civilian government and the protestors who have taken to the streets in support of it, both the African Union and the European Union would be safeguarding their own vital interests in a stable and democratising Sudan – and preventing the re-emergence of threats to the stability of Sudan’s neighbours.