BARELY a week after Algerian dictator, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, was forced out by people’s power, it was the turn of 75-year-old Sudanese President, Omar Hassan Al-Bashir, to bite the dust after 30 years of authoritarian grip. Al-Bashir, an army paratrooper, led an Islamist junta which ousted Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi in a bloodless coup in April 1989.
Al-Bashir bestrode Sudan like an emperor. To strengthen his autocratic hold on power, he had introduced policies that sustained corruption and nepotism. It was a situation that also triggered off years of conflict and insecurity in the Darfur, South Kordofan, and the Blue Nile.
In fact, the International Criminal Court at The Hague, ICC, had issued two arrest warrants against him over the Darfur conflict bordering on genocide. He was also accused of murder, rape and torture. He was the first sitting president to be so charged.
Al Bashir armed Arab pastoralists (Janjaweed) to attack and seize lands from non-Arab black…
