Orbits: Reconciliation Initiatives in Sudan

By: Muawad Mustafa Rashid

Almost all the political initiatives declare that their main goal is to resolve the Sudanese crisis and achieve a national reconciliation in Sudan.
However, some initiatives will inevitably aggravate the crisis and prevail in the state of conflicts and disagreements which hastens the catastrophe in the country.
Of course such initiatives cannot be rejected by any sane person, but at the same time, it is not possible to allow it to be hijacked or to spoil their meanings by tailoring it to fit the size of certain entity.
According to the political customs and traditions of the peoples all over the world, and as entrenched by the human experience, national reconciliation is achieved only when everyone agrees on a serious transitional option, according to which the existing forms of government that led to the crisis are finally liquidated, and new forms are codified by a democratic constitution that safeguards the rights of all and spares the country the disasters of bloody conflicts and civil wars.
The experiences of the peoples who decided, or were forced by the circumstances of crises, to take the paths of the national reconciliation, confirm that reconciliation begins with a fundamental change in the apparatus of the existing/ ousted authority, its constitution, and its laws, besides that anyone of its personnel who committed crimes against the people and the country shall be removed from positions of government responsibility and sent to justice.
I do believe that the national reconciliation, or the national consensus, can be looked at, in part, as a construction for the future and a new experience on the ruins of a tyrannical regime.
It is a fruitful building for a society to reconcile with itself and aspiring a needed state of rights, freedoms, and the rule of law.
Any project for national reconciliation or national consensus should result in an acknowledgment of the crisis and an agreement on the fundamentals that radically address this crisis.
Any approach less than this will be incompatible with the interests of our people and is not commensurate with the bitter sacrifices that they have made.