“We call on the SPLM/A-N to restore the unilateral ceasefire declared six years ago,” NGO Justice Africa Sudan urged in a statement dated August 23. This acronym designates both a political organization, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North, and an armed body, the Sudan People’s Liberation Army-North. This is the third belligerent in the Sudanese war that began on April 15.
The hostilities erupted amid disagreement between Generals Abdel Fattah al-Burhane, head of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo alias “Hemeti”, who chairs the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Initially designed to counter rebel movements, particularly in Darfur, this militia has become in ten years at least as organized, powerful and rich as the regular troops.
Their leader, a former camel driver who left school around the age of 10, was dragging his feet to come under the command of generals who had followed a classic military course. Meanwhile, Islamists of the Omar al-Bashir or “kizan” era have continued to fuel the conflict. These Muslim Brotherhood are very hostile to a new attempt at democratic transition. They fear that this process will spell the final blow to the lucrative empire they have built during three decades of military-Islamic dictatorship. The boss of the SPLM/A-N, Abdelaziz al-Hilu, also intends to take his share of the cake when it comes to sealing peace – even if the truce attempts have so far failed one after the other.
So this ex-comrade in arms of John Garang, considered the father of South Sudan, took advantage of the fighting between the FAS and the FSR to attack the army. In a report published on August 11, the NGO Acled (Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project) counted 33 clashes between the SPLM/A-N and the FAS in July. While the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs of the United Nations records a new wave of violence from August 14.
Officially, the Hilu movement wants to defend its positions. It controls a vast territory between the states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile. These lands are perched on verdant peaks, the Nuba Mountains, and managed by an autonomous government based on secretariats (kinds of ministries), not recognized by Khartoum.
Since the ousting of Omar al-Bashir in April 2019, Hilu has stood firm. He systematically refused to make a pact with the military as well as the militiamen. The rebel boss did not sign the peace agreement reached in Juba on October 3, 2020. Because his flagship demand, the separation of state and religion, was not included. A declaration of principles was initialed to this effect in March 2021, under the government of Abdallah Hamdok. But the putsch perpetrated seven months later, during an alliance of circumstances sealed between Burhane and Hemeti, had postponed the application of the text indefinitely.
“The SPLM/A-N has no clear strategy. He is making a big mistake by violating his own ceasefire to attack the positions of the FAS”, insists Hafiz Ismail, the director of Justice Africa Sudan. The inhabitants of the Nuba Mountains had already been the first victims of the war waged by Bashir’s men in Hilu between 2011 and 2016. During these five long years, aerial bombardments punctuated the daily lives of civilians. Even today, the Sudanese under the rule of the SPLM/A-N survive in extreme precariousness. Less than three out of ten children attend school. Humanitarian access restrictions also deprived an entire generation of vaccines between 2019 and 2022.
And the current conflict further obscures the fate of these residents. “In Kauda, ??the SPLM-N capital, the situation is normal. But the rest of the Nuba Mountains have received many displaced people from the area controlled by Khartoum. Since the beginning of the war, cross-border markets have also closed, which complicates the delivery of basic necessities whose prices have exploded”, describes a resident of Kauda.
On the other side of the front line between rebel troops and the SAF, citizens are paying a heavy price for the clashes, which have displaced 69,400 men, women and children from South Kordofan. The capital of this state, Kadougli, is almost completely besieged by Hilu. This situation has prevented any food distribution since May. The electricity is also cut off.
“Many shells from the SPLM / A-N fell on the neighborhoods of Kadougli, testifies a humanitarian working for an international organization intervening on the spot. If the SPLM/A-N manages to take control of the city, deliveries of food, medicine and fuel will cease completely. This movement does not have the capacity to manage a city of this size,” he warns. This Sudanese criticizes a self-serving decision by Hilu.
“He wants to strengthen his positions in order to gain more weight in the post-war negotiations”, confirms a politician active in the talks trying to build a broad civil front in favor of peace. However, a large section of the population residing in the cities coveted by the SPLM / A-N dreams of joining the project of this charismatic leader.
“This movement has no interest with any party. It is based on the manifesto for a New Sudan which aims to build a Sudanese state based on justice, equality, freedom and democracy. I will support the SPLM-N in both cases, whether it loses or wins, because it fights to end the marginalization that concerns us all”, details a forty-year-old working within a resistance committee of Dilling, another town in South Kordofan bereaved by the Hilu offensive.
The SPLM/A-N Chief’s Office did not respond to our interview requests. At the start of the year, Hilu nevertheless told Point Afrique that he wanted to “put an end to the war”. If relative calm had reigned since 2017, the armistice had never been signed. This fighter had also declared to our microphone that he was ready to proclaim the independence of his territory in the event of the failure of negotiations with Khartoum. Finally, the septuagenarian claimed, as usual, to defend “a just cause”.
