The war in the South Sudan was only affecting the Southerners. The war in Nuba Mountains was only affecting the Nuba people. The war in Blue Nile was only affecting the Blue Nile people and the war in the Darfur Region was only affecting the Darfurean people. The North was at ease. The East was at partial ease, and the Middle Region was at ease. When the North was at ease others were not at ease, and when the Middle Region was at ease others were not at ease. When the East was at its partial ease others were not at ease. When Khartoum women were collecting their jewelries, gold, and their precious belongings to support the Palestinian people and struggle, women of the Western and Southern Sudan and Blue Nile were collecting wild fruits, roots and leaves of the bush to ameliorate their suffering and mitigate their hunger and hardship. They were drinking dirty and contaminated water to quench their thirsty. When people of the North and Middle of Sudan were very busy with the suffering of Palestinians no one was bothering about the suffering of the Sudanese citizens in Southern and Western parts of the country and Blue Nile. Why do they lean towards the Palestinians at a critical angle while they lean towards the Southerners, Westerners, and Blue Nile people at an obtuse angle, why? Is it because their blood thickness is similar to the Palestinians’ blood thickness while it is dissimilar to the blood thickness of the South, West and Blue Nile? Is it because they have strange faces that do not look like their faces, or is it what?
I’m intentionally touching and raising these critical points and hot issues not because I want to provoke any anger of any kind or incite any sedition but rather paving the pathway and leveling the ground for a healthy dialogue about the peace that we need and not the peace that we want. There is a big difference between what we want and what we need. Peace is a need not a want. Peace was a want but now it is a need. Healthy dialogue is governed by certain principles without which dialogue will not actualize its noble purpose and strategic goal. One of these principles is good-faith. Without good-faith sustainable peace will never be made. Without good-faith healthy dialogue converts into unhealthy dialogue and gets dismembered and disjointed.
We are accustomed or used to hiding our heads in the sand and avoiding such unwelcoming questions and embarrassing points of view because we have been educated in the schools and government institutions and offices that such questions are bad questions and that they should not be raised. If you are adamantly resolved to raise these burning and unbearable questions you are labelled as racist and tribalist and that you are wittingly aiming at smearing and soiling the ‘National constants and pillars.’ Old naively innocent generations of our grandmothers and grandfathers have been domesticated in a way that they are erroneously made to believe that there are ‘National constants and pillars’ that should not be touched or approached, and red lines that they should not be crossed and that there are, as well, some forbidden questions that they should not be raised because they are taboos and because they will dismantle the social fabric and cohesion of the Home Land, Sudan. Our old naively innocent generations had been bottled and conditioned to see the world around them through these distorted lenses. If we genuinely mean to build a peace that we need, we must allow ourselves to critically raise such painful issues. Skipping these historical realities and structural injustices will never make sustainable peace a reality. Offenders must confess and apologize, and the victimized must be justly compensated and recognized. The sustainable peace that we need has a cost that must be paid in advance. There is no short-cut road to sustainable peace. Skipping these historical realities will not help in stopping this deadly ongoing futile war but rather feed into escalating it.
Now, no one in Sudan is at ease. All are suffering, all are loudly crying for security and safety, all are looking for a refuge, all are in search of a safe haven. The futile war has extended to every corner of the country. War is a notoriously bad thing. The ongoing war has negatively impacted every household, every family, every community, every region, particularly the North Region and the Middle region. All Sudanese people have bitterly experienced this futile, barbaric and immoral war and now they are in a good position to objectively define this ongoing war in a crystal manner and describe its atrocities and negative repercussions and consequences. War definition by the war-affected people themselves helps in identifying the kind of peace that they need. Since the political independence of this unfortunate and bleeding country, these war-affected people, if they had been genuinely represented and fully and effectively engaged in the peace-making, peace-building, and peace-keeping processes, the outcomes of all those processes would have been a sustainable peace that they need. What we lack in this bleeding country is the principle of good-faith, particularly our pseudo politicians, they are characterized by arrogance, sense of perfection and zero good-faith. We lack mutual trust and reciprocal feedback. Sudanese people are in short supply of good-faith. No mutual recognition, no mutual respect, no mutual consideration of any kind, no compromises, and no flexibility but rigidity. Everyone is flexing his or her muscles and showing their teeth to their own brothers, sisters, relatives and their countrymen and women. No middle area or point but rather absolute extremes and radicalism. Such toxic environment is not conducive for any peace of any kind to sustain. I really wonder “From Where Have These People Come From? I mean the Sudanese!!” I quoted this phrase from our famous writer, Altaeb Salah, peace upon him.
The above-mentioned words are just a backdrop for the issue of ‘The Peace That We Need’.
Stay Well and Tuned.
To be continued.
No for this Futile War, Yes for Sustainable Peace.
Mahjoub Saleem