The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has defined on November 22 as encouraging the political agreement reached in Sudan within the Sovereign Council of Transition, between the components of the security apparatus and the civilian ones, which provides for the reinstallation of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, after his deposition as a result of the coup d’état of last October 25.
A decision which, according to Blinken, could encourage the resumption of political dialogue and lead to the elections scheduled for next year, around which most of the international community expects the establishment of a democratic and pluralist system.
As a result of these developments, the United States has announced the appointment of its own ambassador to Khartoum, John Godfrey, thus raising its diplomatic representation in Sudan from the level of chargé d’affaires to a full-fledged embassy.
The enthusiasm of the United States, however, does not seem to be shared by a large part of the population, which on November 25 took to the streets of the capital and some of the main towns of the country to protest against the agreement, considered a betrayal by both the military and civilian authorities of the Sovereign Transitional Council.
The experience of the coup d’état of last October 25, in fact, and of the violence that followed, has strongly polarized the dimension of the Sudanese political debate, where the main political opposition forces refuse any compromise with the military, and in particular demand the dissolution of the militias of the Rapid Support Forces of General Dagalo and their absorption within the Armed Forces.
Moreover, the protesters consider the compromise reached by Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok as a real betrayal of the political prerogatives at the basis of the transition process, through a choice perceived as merely related to the personal interest of the premier.
In this way, Hamdok is now widely perceived by the Sudanese society as an element of the power apparatus, no longer distinguishable from the power system of the Armed Forces and discredited from a political point of view.
In this sense, the assurances expressed by the Prime Minister regarding the will to maintain a profile of political autonomy with respect to the components of the security apparatus, as well as the guarantees regarding the release of political detainees and the restoration of the prerogatives of the local political system, seem to have been worth nothing.
Therefore, a precarious political and social balance has been determined in the country, characterized by an increasingly evident split in the consensus towards the authorities of the Sovereign Council of Transition, which is now burdened by a dangerous image mortgage also in its civil components.
Equally complex is the situation within the military apparatus, where the balance between the components of the regular army – represented by General al-Burhan – and those of the militias – including the Rapid Support Forces led by General Dagalo – are clearly increasingly precarious and in no way heading towards the transition demanded by the Sudanese political opposition forces.
