Gaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry was a Sudanese military officer and politician who served as the fourth head of state of Sudan from 1969 to 1985, first as Chairman of the National Revolutionary Command Council and then as President.
The National Umma Party is an Islamic political party in Sudan. It was formerly led by Sadiq al-Mahdi, who served twice as Prime Minister of Sudan, and was removed once by inter party conflict and once by a military coup. As of 2019, Major General Fadlallah Baramah Nasser was the acting Chair of the party, and al-Mahdi's daughter, Mariam al-Mahdi, was one of the three vice-chairs.
Sadiq al-Mahdi, also known as Sadiq as-Siddiq, was a Sudanese political and religious figure who was Prime Minister of Sudan from 1966 to 1967 and again from 1986 to 1989. He was head of the National Umma Party and Imam of the Ansar, a Sufi order that pledges allegiance to Muhammad Ahmad (1844–1885), who claimed to be the Mahdi, the messianic saviour of Islam.
The National Congress Party was a major political party that dominated domestic politics in Sudan from its foundation until the Sudanese Revolution.
The National Islamic Front was an Islamist political organization founded in 1976 and led by Dr. Hassan al-Turabi that influenced the Sudanese government starting in 1979, and dominated it from 1989 to the late 1990s. It was one of only two Islamic revival movements to secure political power in the 20th century.
The Democratic Unionist Party, also referred to by itself as the Original Democratic Unionist Party, is a political party in Sudan, closely tied to the Khatmiyya Sufi order.
The Beja Congress is a political group comprising several ethnic entities, most prominently the Beja, of eastern Sudan. It was founded in 1957 by Dr. Taha Osman Bileya together with a group of Beja intellectuals, as a political platform for the politically and economically marginalized Beja people. According to the "Black Book", an analysis of Sudanese regional political representation published underground in the late 1990s by Darfur Islamist followers of Hassan al-Turabi, eastern Sudan has been conspicuous since its independence for its political and economic marginalization. This part of Sudan had fewer ministers and representatives than other parts of the country in the civil and military branches of the central government, as well as having among the lowest rates of education and access to health services in the country.
The Republic of the Sudan was established as an independent sovereign state on 1 January 1956 upon the termination of the condominium of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, over which sovereignty had been vested jointly in Egypt and the United Kingdom. Before 1955, however, whilst still subject to the condominium, the autonomous Sudanese government under Ismail al-Azhari had temporarily halted Sudan's progress toward self-determination, hoping to promote unity with Egypt. Despite his pro-Egyptian National Unionist Party (NUP) winning a majority in the 1953 parliamentary elections, Azhari realized that popular opinion had shifted against such a union. Azhari, who had been the major spokesman for the "unity of the Nile Valley", therefore reversed the NUP's stand and supported Sudanese independence. On December 19, 1955, the Sudanese parliament, under Azhari's leadership, unanimously adopted a declaration of independence that became effective on January 1, 1956. Azhari called for the withdrawal of foreign troops and requested the governments of Egypt and the United Kingdom to sponsor a plebiscite in advance.
On 25 May 1969, several young officers calling themselves the Free Officers Movement seized power in Sudan in a coup d'état and started the Nimeiry era, also called the May Regime, in the history of Sudan. At the conspiracy's core were nine officers led by Colonel Gaafar Nimeiry, who had been implicated in plots against the Abboud regime. Nimeiry's coup preempted plots by other groups, most of which involved army factions supported by the Sudanese Communist Party (SCP), Arab nationalists, or conservative religious groups. He justified the coup on the grounds that civilian politicians had paralyzed the decision-making process, had failed to deal with the country's economic and regional problems, and had left Sudan without a permanent constitution.
The Sudanese Communist Party is a communist party in Sudan. Founded in 1946, it was a major force in Sudanese politics in the early post-independence years, and was one of the two most influential communist parties in the Arab world, the other being the Iraqi Communist Party.
Ahmed Ibrahim Ali Diraige was the former governor of the Sudanese province of Darfur and late head of the National Redemption Front alliance of rebel groups in the Darfur conflict. He was residing in the United Kingdom.
Sir Sayyid Abd al-Rahman al-Mahdi, KBE was one of the leading religious and political figures during the colonial era in Anglo-Egyptian Sudan (1898–1955), and continued to exert great authority as leader of the Neo-Mahdists after Sudan became independent. The British tried to exploit his influence over the Sudanese people while at the same time profoundly distrusting his motives. Throughout most of the colonial era of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, the British saw Sayyid Abd al-Rahman al-Mahdi as important as a moderate leader of the Mahdists.
The Ansar are a Sufi religious movement in the Sudan whose followers are disciples of Muhammad Ahmad, a Sudanese religious leader based on Aba Island who proclaimed himself Mahdi on 29 June 1881. His followers won a series of victories against the Egyptians, culminating in the capture of Khartoum in January 1885.
The Anti-Imperialist Front was a political movement in Sudan, founded in 1952. The Anti-Imperialist Front was organized by the clandestine Sudanese Movement for National Liberation. The communists decided not to try to register their own party ahead of the 1953 legislative election, preferring to launch the Anti-Imperialist Front as their legal umbrella organization.
Sayyid Hadi Abdulrahman al-Mahdi (1918–1971) was a Sudanese political and religious figure. He was a leader of the Sudanese Ansar religious order and was also the uncle of fellow Umma party politician Sadiq al-Mahdi. The Umma party was largely torn in half between 1966 and 1969 as a result of a split between Hadi al-Mahdi and Sadiq al-Mahdi.
The 1969 Sudanese coup d'état was a successful coup, led by Colonel Gaafar Nimeiry, against the government of President Ismail al-Azhari. The coup signaled the end of Sudan's second democratic era, and saw the beginning of Nimeiry's 16 year rule.
The Islamist movement in Sudan started in universities and high schools as early as the 1940s under the influence of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. The Islamic Liberation Movement, a precursor of the Sudanese Muslim Brotherhood, began in 1949. Hassan Al-Turabi then took control of it under the name of the Sudanese Muslim Brotherhood. In 1964, he became secretary-general of the Islamic Charter Front (ICF), an activist movement that served as the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood. Other Islamist groups in Sudan included the Front of the Islamic Pact and the Party of the Islamic Bloc.
Following the 1976 coup attempt, a national reconciliation was reached in Sudan on 7 July 1977, where Nimeiri and al-Mahdi signed an agreement that readmitted the opposition in exchange for the dissolution of the National Front. Civil liberties were restored, and political prisoners were released. The reconciliation also involved shifts in Sudanese politics, with the adoption of Islamic law, known as September Laws, in 1983. Nimeiri faced opposition from various groups, including secularised Muslims and non-Muslim southerners. This move contributed to the resumption of the civil war in the south, leading to conflicts and political shifts.
Abdallah al-Fadil al-Mahdi was a Sudanese statesman and key figure in Sudan's path to independence by playing an important role in the "Gentlemen's Agreement" with Egypt in 1952, enabling Sudan's self-government and self-determination. Abdallah was a National Umma Party member. He resisted Ibrahim Abboud's rule, and after October 1964 revolution, he served on the Sudanese Sovereignty Council and was instrumental in establishing a mosque in the Republican Palace. Abdallah married twice and emphasised education for his children.
