THE SUDAN ELECTIONS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 29, Issue 752, 11 December 1953, Page 24

THE SUDAN ELECTIONS

WISH .. .to direct your attention . . . to the elections which) will decide the fate of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. Why, first of all, is it called the Anglo-Egyp-tian Sudan? Not merely to distinguish it from the Western Sudan, the open savanna country to the South of the Sahara, which is under French administration; but also because, through a turious succession of events, the nominal responsibility for its government was for more than fifty years shared between Great Britain and Egypt... I doubt if one Englishman in a million knew or cared anything about the Sudan until it become involved with the career of General Gordon. .. His fate (at. Khartoum) helped to bring down the Gladstone Government and seemed to give Britain as well as Egypt an interest in the reconquest of the Sudan when the time was ripe. It was reconquered in 1898 by an Egyptian army, stiffened by British troops and commanded by an Englishman, the great Lord Kitchener, . . The distribution of power after the reconquest was a delicaté matter, but an Anglo-Egyptian Convention a few months later provided for effective British control of the administration through a Governor-Gen-eral appointed by the Khedive of Egypt, at the nomination of the British Government. The Sudan did not, however, become part of the British Empire, and Egyptian troops formed part of the garrison. The rule of the fanatical dervishes after Gordon’s death had proved disastrous. A population of 6,000,000 or 8,000,000 had been reduced by about two-thirds. Under British administrators conditions improved; the great Gezira cotton scheme, an irrigation project made possible by a British guarantee, provided the basis for increasing prosperity after the First World War; and local government and education were encouraged. But the difficult relationship between Great Britain and Egypt naturally brought difficulties in the Sudan also. In 1924 Sir Lee Stack, Sirdar of the Egyptian Army and Gov-ernor-General of the Sudan, was murdered. Lord Allenby, who was then High Commissioner in Egypt, demanded that all Egyptian troops be withdrawn from the Sudan. . . However, when Mussolini’s Abyssinian War brought the Egyptian Government into a more conciliatory frame of mind towards Britain and the JFreaty of 1936 was signed, _Egyptian troops were readmitted to the Sudan, though I do not think there are any there today. There have been many changes in recent years. A new National movement, encouraged no doubt by better education and increased prosperity, has arisen in the Sudan. Former officials speak highly of the "courage, tolerance and honesty" of the Sudanese, and these qualities have permitted an unusually rapid advance towards selfgovernment. In calling the movement nationalist, perhaps I am begging the question; for the peoples of the equatorial provinces, About 30 per cent of the totalpopulation, are not Muslims like. the northern Sudanese. They are mostly primitive pagans, with quite a different outlook on life. Some of them have come under Christian missionary

influence. It has been necessary to make special provision for them in the proposals for constitutional advance, However, an advisory council for the Northern Sudan was set up in 1944, when the war was over in Africa, and it worked so well that in 1948 a new constitution was introduced for the whole country with an almost entirely Sudanese legislative assembly and an executive council with a Sudanese majority. Now this constitutional progress excited some alarm in Egypt, as it was obviously a halfway house to full selfgovernment, Egypt has never forgotten that she had, so to speak, half a right to the Sudan and undoubtedly hopes one day to control it again. She has a good argument in her favour-the unity of the Nile Valley, on whose unfailing water supply Egypt’s life depends. We must be careful not to undervalue this argument, for it was an argument Great Britain used, when she occupied Egypt, against control of the upper Nile Valley by a foreign Power, to wit, France, in the famous Fashoda Incident just after Kitchener’s conquest in 1898. The proEgyptian party in the Sudan, especially strong in the towns, would not take part in working the 1948 constitution, claiming, no doubt, that it was undermining Egypt’s rights. In October, 1951, Egypt declared the condominium abrogated, and King Farouk rounded off his titles by assuming that of King of the Sudan. ‘This disharmony hampered the constitutional progress of the Sudan, but did not stop it. A Sudanese commission of self-government presided over by a British judge had to be dissolved in 1951 because of the dissensions of its members, but not before it had done some sound work, and the fall of King Farouk introduced a greater realism into Egyptian policy. An attempt has been made by the present Egyptian Gdvernment to reach agreement with all the more important Sudanese leaders, and this, of course, has necessitated concessions to the Sudanese Nationalist point of view. It also made possible an, Anglo-Egyp-tian agreement on the subject, which was concluded on February 12 last. This provided for the election before the end

of this year of a constituent assembly, which is to determine the future of the Sudan, and for the appointment of an international commission, with an Indian president, to supervise the elections, These elections are now taking place. The parties divide into two main groups. One group favours independence for the Sudan. Within this group there is a Sdcialist Republican Party, well schooled, as the name suggests, in the latest slogans of Middle Eastern nationalism; but probably mainly aimed at the chief traditionalist party, the Umma party headed by none other than the son of the old Mahdi, Sir Sated Abdel Rahman el Mahdi Pasha, who has been credited, though he disclaims it, with aiming at a crown. What better proof. could there be, by the way, that Britain bears few grudges! The titles suggest that the son of Britain’s old enemy, who must be an old man-for the Mahdi died in 1885--has waxed fat 2nd prospered under British rule. The other group of parties stand, in varying .iegrees, for a close relationship with Egypt. Some of you will have seen that the Egyptian Government has demanded that British officials be withdrawn from certain provinces for interfering with the elections. Perhaps they explained to the illiterate electors what the voting arrangements meant. However, the International Commission, after investigation, rejected the demand. Some of you may also have noticed a picture which appeared in the Otago Daily Times and maybe in other newspapers of a Sudanese. peasant riding with his baggage on his ox to cast his vote at the elections, It was a good picture, and I wonder if perhaps it was symbolic. The man on the ox seemed to me to symbolise the Sudanese politician, riding to power. The patient ox, I suggest, symbolised the Sudanese

peasant.

PROFESSOR

W. P.

MORRELL

November 28, 7953

i = Extracts from a recent commentary on the international news, broadcast from the main National Stations of the NZBS "a Coe