Gaafar Nimeiry

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Jaafar Nimeiry
)

Prime Minister of Sudan
In office
28 October 1969 – 11 August 1976
PresidentHimself
Preceded byBabiker Awadalla
Succeeded byRashid Bakr
In office
10 September 1977 – 6 April 1985
PresidentHimself
Preceded byRashid Bakr
Succeeded byAl-Jazuli Daf'allah
Personal details
Born(1930-01-01)1 January 1930
Wad Nubawi, Omdurman, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan
Died30 May 2009(2009-05-30) (aged 79)
Omdurman, Sudan
Political party
  • Sudanese Socialist Union (while in power)[1]
  • Alliance of the Peoples' Working Forces (after return from exile, merged with
    Sudanese Socialist Democratic Union
    was established in 2008 as the successor party)
Military service
Allegiance 
Field Marshal

Gaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry (otherwise spelled in English as Gaafar Nimeiry, Jaafar Nimeiry, or Ja'far Muhammad Numayri;

head of state of Sudan from 1969 to 1985, first as Chairman of the National Revolutionary Command Council and then as President.[5]

A military officer, he came to power after a

socialist and Pan-Arabist policies and close collaboration with Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt and Muammar Gaddafi of Libya. In 1971 Nimeiry survived a pro-Soviet coup attempt, after which he forged an alliance with Mao Zedong of China, and, eventually, with the United States as well.[4]

In 1972 he signed the Addis Ababa Agreement, ending the First Sudanese Civil War. In his last years in power he also adopted aspects of Islamism, and in 1983 he imposed Sharia law throughout the country, precipitating the Second Sudanese Civil War. He was ousted from power in 1985 and went into exile in Egypt. He returned in 1999 and unsuccessfully ran in the presidential elections in 2000.

Early life and education

Nimeiry was educated at the Omdurman primary and elementary school, then in

War College in Omdurman in 1952. He also earned a Master of Military Science from Army Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, United States in 1966.[7]

Nimeiri moved on to different positions in the

Sudanese Army. He was accused in 1957 of orchestrating a coup d'état against the Sudanese government,[8] but there was not enough evidence to prove that he was involved. He was interrogated again about a failed coup attempt led by an officer named Khalid Yusuf, but the investigation did not find anything to criminalize Nimeiry in the attempted coup.[citation needed
]

On 28 December 1966, Lieutenant Hussein Osman with other young Communist officers tried to seize the presidential palace and the central post office, but failed. Among the 400 people arrested after the coup attempt failed was Colonel Gaafar Nimeiry, then commanding the Eastern Command. He was released on 9 January 1967 and transferred to command the infantry school.[9]

1969–1980

Early years in power and socialist reforms

Nimeiry, Nasser and Gaddafi in Tripoli, 1969

On 25 May 1969, together with four other officers, Colonel Nimeiry, commanding the Khartoum Garrison, overthrew the civilian government of Ismail al-Azhari, his coup being termed the "May Revolution". He created and chaired the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC). Edgar O'Ballance, writing in 1977, said that the 14 seniormost officers of the Sudanese Armed Forces were all out of the country at the time "either on official or private visits," so the "time chosen was opportune."[10] On 26 May, he suspended the constitution, dissolved the Supreme Council, the National Assembly, and the Civil Service Commission, and ordered that all political parties disband. That day he also promoted himself to major-general, retired 22 serving officers, mostly senior to himself, dismissed over 30, and appointed 14 new officers to the most important posts.[11]

Nimeiry became

socialist and Pan-Arabist
reforms.

In March–April 1970 Nimeiry ordered an aerial bombardment on

Umma Party which opposed him.[12] O'Ballance writes that about 4,000 troops, plus tanks, stormed Aba Island on 30 March, supported by aircraft.[13]

Later in 1971, he was elected President winning a referendum with 98.6 per cent of the votes. He then dissolved the RCC and founded the Sudanese Socialist Union[7] which he declared to be the only legal political organization.[12] In 1972 he signed the Addis Ababa Agreement whereby autonomy was granted to the non-Muslim southern region of Sudan, which ended the First Sudanese Civil War and ushered in an 11-year period of peace and stability to the region. In 1973 he drafted a new constitution which declared Sudan to be a democratic, socialist state and gave considerable power to the office of President.[12]

Coup attempts and alliance with China and the West

Nimiery with Marshal Tito in 1970

In 1970 Nimeiry successfully weathered a coup attempt by former Prime Minister and Umma Party leader Sadiq al-Mahdi, and in 1971 was briefly removed from power by a Communist coup, before being restored. During the 1971 coup attempt, Nimeiry jumped out the window of the place where he was incarcerated when his supporters came to rescue him.[4]

After this coup, he started to move away from Soviet influence and began to receive arms from the US and Maoist China.[4][14] In April 1972, he signed an agreement with China, by which Chinese military advisers began training the Sudanese Army, and further providing for Chinese sale of MiG-19 fighter aircraft; Mao Zedong also provided Sudan with interest-free loans, and Chinese state companies began constructing a number of public works in Sudan, including factories, roads, bridges and conference centers.[15] Sudanese collaboration with China continued even after Nimeiry was overthrown in 1985.

In late 1975, a military coup by Communist members of the armed forces, led by Brigadier Hassan Hussein Osman, failed to remove Nimeiry from power. General Elbagir, Nimeiry's deputy, led a counter coup that brought Nimeiry back within few hours. Brigadier Osman was wounded and later court martialed and executed.[16]

Nimeiry with US President Gerald Ford in the White House, 1976

In the mid-1970s, he launched several initiatives to develop agriculture and industry in Sudan and he invited foreign Western and Chinese companies to explore for oil.[12] Chevron would discover oil reserves in South-Central Sudan in 1979. In general he began a more moderate economic policy, where some banks and industries were returned to private ownership (although the state was still in control of much of the economy) and foreign investment was encouraged, as evidenced by a number of bilateral investment treaties: with the Netherlands 22 August 1970, Switzerland 17 February 1974, Egypt 28 May 1977, and France 31 July 1978. In July 1978 at the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) summit in Khartoum, Nimeiry was elected Chairman of the OAU until July 1979.

1976 Sudanese coup d'état attempt

In 1976, a force of one thousand insurgents under Sadiq al Mahdi, armed and trained by Libya, crossed the border from Ma'tan as-Sarra. After passing through Darfur and Kordofan, the insurgents engaged in three days of house-to-house fighting in Khartoum and Omdurman that killed some 3,000 people and sparked national resentment against the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Nimeiry and his government were narrowly saved after a column of army tanks entered the city.[17] Ninety-eight people implicated in the plot were executed.[4]

National Reconciliation

Sadiq al Mahdi, the leader of the opposition who was based abroad, and Nimeiry. A limited measure of pluralism was allowed and Sadiq al Mahdi and members of the Democratic Unionist Party joined the legislature under the umbrella of the Sudan Socialist Union. Hassan al-Turabi, an Islamist leader who had been imprisoned and then exiled after the May Revolution, was invited back and became Justice Minister and Attorney General in 1979. Relations between Khartoum and Southern Sudan leadership worsened after the National Reconciliation and the National Reconciliation itself came to a premature end in light of disagreements between the opposition and Nimeiry.[18]

1980–1985

Second term as president

Nimeiry in 1981

Nimeiry was one of only two

Arab leaders (the other being Qaboos bin Said of Oman) who maintained close relations with Anwar Sadat after the Camp David Accords
of 1978. He attended Sadat's funeral in 1981.

In 1981, Nimeiry, pressured by his Islamic opponents, began a dramatic shift toward

In 1984 and 1985, after a period of drought, several million people were threatened by famine, particularly in western Sudan. The government tried to hide the situation internationally.[22]

Inflation

Between 1980 and 1985, the Sudanese pound lost 80 percent of its value due to inflation and renewed civil war.[citation needed]

1985 Revolution

Political and economic discontent against Nimeiry had been growing for several years prior to 1985. According to a Sudanese individual interviewed by

October 1964 Revolution.[22]

Exile and return

On 6 April 1985, while Nimeiry was on an official visit to the United States of America in the hope of gaining more financial aid from Washington, a bloodless military coup led by his defence minister General Abdel Rahman Swar al-Dahab ousted him from power. During the subsequent elections the pro-Islamist leader, Sadiq al-Mahdi was elected Prime Minister.

Nimeiry lived in exile in Egypt from 1985 to 1999, in a villa situated in

Second Sudanese civil war that was signed in a Comprehensive Peace Agreement
on 9 January 2005.

Nimeiry died of natural causes in his home in Omdurman on 30 May 2009. Tens of thousands turned up to his official funeral including members of Sudan's political forces that had opposed his rule. After Nimeiry's death in May 2009, former Revolutionary Command Council member Khaled Hassan Abbass was elected head of the Alliance of Peoples' Working Forces. Splits occurred amongst the supporters of Nimeiry with some endorsing the partnership with the National Congress and others alleging that the National Congress reneged on the merger agreement and did not properly implement it. The splinter groups formed the May Socialist Union which took part in the parliamentary elections in Sudan in 2010. Another group led by Professor Dr. Fatima Abdel Mahmoud set up the Sudanese Socialist Democratic Union Party as the successor party of the Sudanese Socialist Union. Abdel Mahmoud was the first woman cabinet Minister in Sudan in the 1970s, and the first Sudanese woman to contest the presidency in the 2010 Sudanese election.

References

  1. ^ Sudan: A Country Study "Role in Government" United States Library of Congress. Accessed on 10 September 2007.
  2. ^ "المشير. جعفر محمد نميري". Archived from the original on 5 December 2018. Retrieved 5 December 2018.
  3. .
  4. ^ a b c d e Dennis Hevesi (11 June 2009). "Gaafar al-Nimeiry, a Sudan Leader With Shifting Politics, Dies at 79". The New York Times.
  5. ^ "Gaafar al-Nimeiry". The Telegraph. 1 June 2009. Retrieved 3 February 2024.
  6. ^ "?????". Archived from the original on 27 June 2014. Retrieved 18 September 2018.
  7. ^ .
  8. .
  9. ^ O'Ballance, Secret War in the Sudan, F&F, 1973, 93.
  10. ^ OBallance 1977, p. 103.
  11. ^ OBallance 1977, p. 104.
  12. ^ . Retrieved 13 February 2011.
  13. ^ OBallance 1977, p. 107.
  14. Human Right Watch
    . 2003. Retrieved 8 January 2020.
  15. ^ Ismail Debeche, The role of China in international relations: the impact of ideology on foreign policy with special reference to Sino-African relations (1949-1986), pp. 851-858, 1987, University of York
  16. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved 25 July 2023.
  17. , p. 111
  18. ^ "Sudan - National Reconciliation". countrystudies.us. Retrieved 21 July 2023.
  19. JSTOR 4328194
    .
  20. . Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  21. ^ .
  22. ^ from the original on 16 October 2019. Retrieved 16 October 2019.
  23. ^ Miller, Judith (7 April 1985). "Sudan's president is ousted in coup by military chief". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 24 May 2015. Retrieved 16 October 2019.
  • O'Ballance, Edgar (1977). The Secret War in the Sudan: 1955–1972. London: .

External links