 | |
| Nickname | MANSAM |
|---|---|
| Focus | women's rights in Sudan |
| Location | |
Key people | Alaa Salah [1] |
MANSAM or Women of Sudanese Civic and Political Groups [2] [3] is an alliance of eight political women's groups, 18 civil society organisations, two youth groups and individuals in Sudan that was active in the Sudanese Revolution. [4]
MANSAM started in August 2018 as a coordination between Sudanese women organising for their rights, who communicated using WhatsApp instant messaging and met in private homes. [5]
MANSAM played a significant role in the Sudanese Revolution. [5] It was one of the signers of the 1 January declaration that created the Forces of Freedom and Change (FFC), [2] the main broad alliance of organisations, networks and political parties that played a dominating coordinating role in the Sudanese Revolution starting in December 2018. [6] [7] Arrests of MANSAM members in 2019 strengthened the group. [5]
On 2 July 2019, during negotiations between the Transitional Military Council (TMC) and the FFC on behalf of civilian groups, MANSAM stated that women had been excluded from the negotiations, despite women's prominent role in the protests and MANSAM being a member of the FFC. [4] According to Alaa Salah speaking as a member of MANSAM at the 8649th meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), on 29 October 2019, [8] after "strong advocacy by women's groups", one woman participated in the negotiations. [1]
MANSAM played a role in supporting women's representation in the Abdallah Hamdok Cabinet. [5] On 16 August 2019, MANSAM objected to the "poor representation of women" in proposed memberships of the Sovereignty Council and the transitionary cabinet of ministers, and called for "a minimum of 50% women in leadership roles in government". MANSAM stated that it had provided the FFC leadership with "high [calibre] nominations, in collaboration with the relevant professional associations, only to be faced with a final list that does not include any of our nominations, without further discussion or consultation." MANSAM called women's organisations, women politicians and allies to "raise their voice" in supporting equal representation for women. [3]
As a member of MANSAM, which is one of the major Sudanese women's networks that signed the 1 January 2019 Forces of Freedom and Change declaration, [9] Alaa Salah gave a speech at the 29 October 2019 meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). [10]
Salah stated that despite women often having constituted 70% of protestors, they were "side-lined in the formal political process" of creating transitional institutions. She stated that women's representation in the new governance structure "[fell] far below [their] demand of 50% parity". She argued that "there is no excuse for [women] not to have an equal seat at every single table". She summarised her argument for women's representation stating,
After decades of struggle and all that we risked to peacefully end Bashir's dictatorship—gender inequality is not and will never be acceptable to the women and girls of Sudan. I hope it is equally unacceptable to the members of this Chamber.
— Alaa Salah, Statement to UNSC, 29 October 2019
Salah also called for judicial accountability and disarmament; and for the political process to be inclusive of women, "civil society, resistance groups, ethnic and religious minorities, those who have been displaced, and people with disabilities to lead to sustainable peace". [11]
MANSAM grew to become the biggest women's coalition in Sudan, composed of fifty women's groups, among which nine were associated with political parties. Earlier women's movements in Sudan had strong connections with political parties, leading to situations where women active in MANSAM stopped being active in supporting women's rights once they had achieved political positions of power on behalf of their political parties. [5]
In April 2022, Women from the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF) left MANSAM, stating that MANSAM wasn't sufficiently supporting national peace around Sudan, was favouring Khartoum politics over the periphery of Sudan, and that "some individuals" were using MANSAM to advance their personal goals. MANSAM made counteraccusations against the Women from the SRF in relation to their actions and consequences in relation to the 2021 Sudan coup d'état. [5]
Relations of MANSAM participants to political parties made it difficult to achieve consensus on policies. According to Sudanese feminist Reem Abbas, after the 2021 coup, MANSAM played more of a role as a "stepping stone" for women seeking political careers rather than an organisation lobbying for women's rights. Abbas stated that, "despite its shortcomings, [MANSAM] still managed to bring women together to align themselves over political parties and coalitions." [5]
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.
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The Sudan People's Liberation Movement–North, or SPLM–N, is a political party and militant organisation in the Republic of Sudan, based in the states of Blue Nile and South Kordofan. The group's armed forces are formally known as the Sudan People's Liberation Army–North or SPLA–N. As of 2017, its two factions, SPLM-N (Agar) and SPLM-N (al-Hilu) were engaged in fighting each other and against the government of Sudan, and as of 2023, the al-Hilu faction is fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), while the leader of the Agar faction was appointed into the military-run government.
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Kandake of the Sudanese Revolution is a photograph of Alaa Salah, a 22-year-old student, standing on top of a car, dressed in white and gold, and leading a crowd of demonstrators in chant during the Sudanese anti-government protests on 8 April 2019. The photograph, taken by activist Lana Haroun using a smartphone, gained world-wide media attention and went viral in April 2019, and was described by several media organisations as iconic, representing women's participation in the revolution who were dubbed the Kandakas.
The Transitional Military Council (TMC) was the military junta governing Sudan that was established on 11 April 2019, after the 2019 Sudanese coup d'état that took place during the Sudanese Revolution, and was formally headed by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, Inspector of the Armed Forces, after Ahmed Awad Ibn Auf resigned as leader one day following the coup.
Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, generally referred to mononymously as Hemedti, Hemetti, Hemeti, or Hemitte, is a Janjaweed leader from the Rizeigat tribe in Darfur, who was the Deputy head of the Transitional Military Council (TMC) following the 2019 Sudanese coup d'état. Since 2013, Hemetti has commanded the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). He was considered by The Economist to be the most powerful person in Sudan as of early July 2019.
A series of political agreements among Sudanese political and military forces for a democratic transition in Sudan began in July 2019. Omar al-Bashir overthrew the democratically elected government of Sadiq al-Mahdi in 1989 and was himself overthrown in the 2019 Sudanese coup d'état, in which he was replaced by the Transitional Military Council (TMC) after months of sustained street protests. Following further protests and the 3 June Khartoum massacre, TMC and the Forces of Freedom and Change (FFC) alliance agreed on 5 July 2019 to a 39-month transition process to return to democracy, including the creation of executive, legislative and judicial institutions and procedures.
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19 December 2018 – August/September 2019; transition plan: August/September 2019 – November/December 2022 | |
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