Jamal Muhammad Ibrahim
(1)
Perhaps the phenomenon of numerous military coups has spread throughout the African continent, as their countries have been freed from the Western colonial regimes that have been controlling their destinies for years, some for decades, and most of them for centuries. What was hidden from students of the humanities, including sociology, politics, social anthropology, and psychology – and most of these sciences have developed over the past centuries – is that this experiment was led by thinkers who provided justifications and supports that established false concepts about the fact that inequality is a natural thing among humans, and thus helped in sustaining the experiment. Colonialism and the legitimization of the concepts on which that experience was based.
The phrase: “The white man’s burden,” which came in a poem by Rudyard Kipling, the famous poet of colonial Britain, was the expression that expresses the colonial experience with all its loads of racial superiority and recognition of the disparity between people. But if we postpone looking at what has happened and is happening in the African continent in terms of military coups and political unrest, I think it is unwise to burden that experience with all the burdens and all those failures that the continent is experiencing, and that Sudan is experiencing, which was one of the first countries to gain independence south of its Sahara. A discreet Sudanese writer revealed the colonial experience in Sudan, as history researcher Professor Hamad Al-Nil Abdul Qadir wrote: (There is a relationship between colonialism on the one hand, and nationalism, the state, and sovereignty on the other hand. It is difficult to build a modern state on undefined nationalism, and thus the concept of sovereignty, patriotism, and the sense of homeland are incomplete. Individuals do not feel it when the colonizer takes it from them. While acknowledging the negatives of the colonial experience in Sudan, perhaps this phrase explains the destruction and destruction that befell Sudan of humans, plowing, and cultivation, and even of all components of the state. Does the burden of all of that fall on the old colonial colonizer alone? .?
(2)
What happened in Sudan historically, and also happened to varying degrees in many African countries, and perhaps also in some Latin American countries, and a few countries of the Asian continent, may push us to look objectively and not condemn the colonial experience in its comprehensiveness despite its clear injustices. Perhaps the words of the great thinker Ali Mazrui In his last days: “The African is incapable of governing himself.” This does not exonerate the experience of the colonial settler, but rather it encourages us to embrace its positive aspects. However, it also does not push us to label the leaders of the population groups in all of those countries with their inability and addiction to their failure to rule their countries that were in the captivity of the colonial-colonial experience. Do you think that Mazrui was correct when he presented what he called benign colonialism?
In our opinion, there is something that explains the bias of the distinguished African thinker, Ali Mazrui, in his proposal, which is his desire for the return of colonialism once again to the African continent. In fact, the colonial experience adopted principles that came from the spirit of the slogan of the Egyptians, Sumerians, and ancient Greeks: “Divide and rule,” to divide enemies for the purpose of controlling them. The colonial method of governance since the years of the nineteenth century has been based on that unjust slogan of managing its colonies indirectly, with the help of local leaders in those countries, thus weakening the elements of meeting, mixing and cooperation between the various ethnic groups of the population. This includes management style
Colonies for many of its colonies in the African continent, and Sudan was no exception.
(3)
After the end of the years of World War II, there is a question that emerged as a result of the rising voice of the colonizers (opening the second meme) demanding that the colonizers (breaking the second meme) grant them the rights to determine their own destinies. Most of the countries of Africa gained their independence in those intermediate years of the twentieth century. Did these developments take place after An in-depth review and real assessment of the overall colonial experiences that took root since the nineteenth century, and only retreated under the pressures of the era known as the Cold War. .?
If we take a keen look, we will see that the Charter, which contained the principles for establishing the United Nations, and whose beginnings were agreed upon by the Allied countries since the “Yalta” Conference, only took about two months in 1945 to be drafted, to be the guide for international peace and security and protect the world from falling into the third century. In a future world war.
(4)
Thus, although the focus in the International Charter was on the controls to spare the world from the scourge of any war that might occur in the future, it did not include a deep study of the colonial experience and its consequences, and the possibility of sustaining or ending it, while the features of the Cold War era and the struggle between…
Two superpowers dominated the international scene. However, after a short time, it became clear that there is a need to reach a new consensus that guarantees international peace and security, and it must be based on more established and deeply rooted principles and values. This was not possible except by relying on the people of thought and the wise people of the world, so agreement was reached again in 1947, to formulate new covenants based more on all human values, in the company of the heavenly religions of Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and many generous people Advances, philosophical doctrines, and broader human thought.
Representatives of the United Nations agreed to a committee headed by Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of the former American president, and it included participants from the East and the West, from the rich and the poor, and from the North and the South, who were represented by the most reliable standards of sound human conscience. That committee worked for about two full years, and through the efforts of all its members, the Bill of Human Rights, known as the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” was issued in October 1948. Perhaps I would claim that the compulsory nature of this Charter, which was completed over two full years, is more compulsory than the United Nations Charter itself, which was completed over the course of only two months. If this had been done, the International Charter would not have become subject to belittlement and neglect, due to its inability to contain conflicts, conflicts and wars, and would have become a matter of pity, not ridicule. Human beings’ capacities for reason and rationality are limited and may be affected by falsehood from below or above them, and developments may require amendments or additions to the United Nations Charter.
(5)
One of the repercussions of historical shortsightedness is the wars that are being fought in the coming decades of the third millennium. On the borders of Asia and Europe, there is a brutal war between Russia and Ukraine, and in Sudan, in the middle of the African continent, a war between the Sudanese themselves and instigated by strangers hiding behind the country’s borders, making that war more like a regional civil war in the ancient Sudanese belt. As for the Gaza Strip, the people of Zion are treating the Palestinians with comprehensive destruction. Rather, it is a “Holocaust” ten times greater than the one that Nazi Hitler inflicted on them.
One of the scourges of colonialism in its use of governance methods with indirect local administration is that the pages of its colonialism were closed during the years of the Cold War, leaving most of the countries of the African continent suffering under the heavy burden of a file of discordant tribes, ethnicities, and sects distributed among many African countries, whose borders were drawn by arbitrary political ambitions and agreements between powers. Alien colonialism on the continent. Sudan is no exception. You can look to see Sudan of the twentieth century after its independence, and it faced a crisis of colonialism that would not allow the Sudanese, no matter how much ability they had, to overcome its negative repercussions. The colonialist left and left behind for Sudan a border problem with Egypt in the Halayeb and Shalatin triangle, a second border crisis in the Fashqa region with Ethiopia, a third crisis with Libya and Chad over the “Al-Masara” border triangle, a fourth over the “Alimi” triangle on the border with Kenya, and another dormant triangle. With the Congo, it is shared by the Zande tribe, two-thirds here and one third there. After the independence of South Sudan, the last two border crises spread from Sudan to the state of South Sudan.
It is Sudan’s destiny that its internal wars erupt for reasons related to this heavy legacy of border problems, in its east, west and south. As for its north, it remained intact due to deeper communication between Egypt, although the dispute over Halayeb and Shalatin remains and has not been resolved yet, as we see Sudan’s complaint in the United Nations files, renewed every session of the United Nations since 1958.
(6)
The wise call to the Sudanese is for them to carefully consider the history of their country, and the history and geography of the African continent as a whole, so that they can realize the dimensions of the heavy legacy left behind by colonialism there, and pay attention to the blessing of diversity, if they are destined for social, economic and political participation to exploit it.
It is not useful to place all the blame on those bitter colonial experiences, or to place the burden of the failure and wars on other parties, but for them to explore the dimensions of the diversity that Sudan has enjoyed, to see the blessing of human brotherhood among them, and to pay attention with sincere intentions to heal the wounds of the past, which is burdened with conflicts, disagreements and rivalries. And that minds come together before hands to plan and build a framework for a nation, in a country that is the first to gain independence south of the African Sahara belt, and is one of the founders of the Organization of African Unity and those who drafted its charters, and it has now become the “African Union” organization. Sudan has a role that no other country on the continent will assume. It is the leader and should not trail the countries of the African continent. It is rich in resources and should not be the poorest. It is successful due to the genius of its position, not the most addicted to coups and political failure. .
–٢٤/4/2024
