Introduction

Democracy as a concept and practice is rather new to Sudan. The norms of governance in the tribally based kingdoms and the Islamic Sultanates that existed in the country prior to the Anglo-Egyptian colonization of the country in 1898 were based on different levels of participation through ‘Islamic Shura’, which is a non-binding consultation process. The concept of democracy was introduced in the late 1930s by the British colonial authorities and, by the mid-1940s, was only practised in organizations such as students’ unions and trade unions.

The first notable modern political organization in Sudan was the Graduate Congress (1939–52), which included all modern school graduates of the country. The Graduate Congress was formed by a conglomeration of two cultural groups, which had emerged in the 1930s in the capital and other major cities. One was the Abu Rouf group, which largely embodied Egyptian inclinations towards Arabization and Fabian ideas. The other was the Mourada group, which by contrast, was characterized more by a Sudanese nationalist identity within an Arabized context. Parts of the country with inhabitants of mostly African origin, such as the Nuba Mountains and Southern Sudan were outside the agenda and scope of the Graduate Congress, while Darfur and Blue Nile were given peripheral attention. All political parties in the country emerged from this broad organization in the years from 1946 to 1952 and were characterized by exclusionist platforms.

Influenced by the ideas of the Indian Congress, the Graduate Congress adopted peaceful methods of struggle for independence, projecting itself as having an Arabized and Islamized identity, but with the ideology of democracy according to the Westminster pattern. The 1955/1956 census indicated, however, that only 39 per cent were of Arabic origin and about 70 per cent Muslim (CBS 1956).

The colonial policies of Arabization and economic and social development also privileged the North and middle parts of the country, while marginalizing other parts, including the Nuba Mountains, Southern Sudan, Darfur and Blue Nile. Since they were all denied representation in the Graduate Congress, the populations of these peripheral regions often resorted to armed resistance in attempts to change their predicament. Such resistance gradually led to the eruption of civil wars, which continue to ravage much of present-day Sudan.