Bashir is Back: Young Sudanese Activists React to the ICC's Failed Attempt to Detain Their President

Bashir is Back

By Niko Chike

Bashir is back.  On a street in Khartoum, at a seeta chai (small tea street stand) that, in spite of the late hour, has many of its bambers (low, backless stools) occupied, it looks a lot like yesterday.

Bashir almost didn't come back today, though.  Sudan would have moved on without him, surely, even if it couldn’t figure out what to do with itself.   In the cracks and alleys and late-night tea meetings, those who don’t want Bashir back, fell back into place and the world moved on.

"We are weak," Adaab said, as an explanation of Sudan's failure to hold Al-Bashir accountable for offenses enacted in Darfur during his regime.  But it is the responsibility of Sudan, not the International Criminal Court, to do so, he asserts.  "No matter what happens, if the ICC [does] anything, he is still our president…. He is the president of Sudan.  So, if we want justice, we want to make the justice by ourselves, by our hand...He murdered our people.  He [does] a lot of bad stuff.  But we want justice for ourselves; not for the ICC."

It is around 10 in the evening, and Adaab has been on the street volunteering with one of Khartoum's grassroots social service agencies since 7am, he says.  He is in the company of other young activists, sitting on bambers, talking, laughing, sipping from tea glasses and swiping cellphones.  They were too young to remember a pre-Bashir Sudan.  There was a hope, though, that there was something better than what Sudan had been for them.

"Maybe it will be a first step for success," says a young tea-drinking pundit.  He doesn't hold his tongue about his hope for a different government in Sudan, "The problem in Sudan--this government.   It should…go to hell.  When I heard that Omar Bashir [had] come back, I feel like [I had] lost my hope.  It's a big problem.  I don't want him to come back because he is a criminal."

Halid, another young man hanging out that night, agrees with Adaab, saying that Bashir must be tried by the Sudanese people for his role in the fighting in Sudan.  "Bashir is one of [the] Sudanese people," he explains, "We need to bring him to law, Sudanese law."  However, the prolonged crisis can not be explained as a mushkeela created only by Al-Bashir, he adds.  "It is not the fault of Al-Bashir alone.   The society of the Sudan is also responsible for that…Al-Bashir's just moving it."  There is racism in Sudan and political parties exploiting the crisis in Darfur for political reasons, he charges.  And the parties "don’t care about the people.  They don’t care about the people in Darfur," he asserts.

Munwar, another activist, says he "was going to be joyful for what [was] happening to Al-Bashir because it [would be] justice for Sudanese people and everyone," for the crimes Al-Bashir committed in, "Jibal al Nuba, Darfur and a lot of places in Sudan."

Bashir's crisis in South Africa created a moment in Sudan like no other over the past twenty-five years of his regime in Sudan.  In this moment, the possibility of a new and better Sudan felt closer than it had in a long while.

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