26, January 2019
Sudan: Former Prime Minister calls for President Bashir to quit as protests mount 0
The leader of Sudan’s largest opposition party, Sadiq al-Mahdi, called on President Omar al-Bashir’s government to heed protesters and resign in an address to supporters at a mosque across the River Nile from Khartoum Friday.
“This regime has to go immediately,” Mahdi told hundreds of worshippers at a mosque in Omdurman, the twin city of the capital Khartoum, which has seen near daily anti-government protests. Hundreds of protesters then marched through Omdurman after Friday prayers, until police fired teargas to try to break up the rally.
Mahdi said that since the protests against Bashir’s government erupted on December 19, “more than 50 people have been killed” in violence during the demonstrations.
Officials say 30 people have died in the protests, while rights groups have put the death toll at more than 40.
“The most important demand is that this regime must leave and be replaced by a transitional government,” Mahdi said at the mosque, which has links to his Umma Party.
“A period of transition will come soon… we are supporting this (protest) movement,” said Mahdi, leader of Sudan’s opposition Umma Party whose government was toppled by Bashir in an Islamist-backed coup in 1989. After nearly a year in exile, Mahdi returned to Sudan last month on the same day protests began.
Mahdi said Friday his party has signed a document with the Sudanese Professionals’ Association (SPA) that is leading the campaign against Bashir’s government.
“This is a document for change and freedom,” Mahdi said. “Together we will hold peaceful demonstrations in Sudan and outside of Sudan,” he said as he condemned the violence and use of “live ammunition” against protesters.
A fixture of Sudanese politics since the 1960s, Mahdi was prime minister from 1966 to 1967 and again from 1986 to 1989.
His government was the last one to be democratically elected in Sudan, before it was toppled by Bashir. Since then Mahdi’s Umma Party has acted as Sudan’s main opposition group and has regularly campaigned against the policies of Bashir’s government.
The ongoing protest movement however has been spearheaded by the SPA, an umbrella group of unions representing doctors, teachers and engineers. Analysts say the movement has emerged as the biggest challenge yet to Bashir’s rule.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP and REUTERS)
29, January 2019
Congo-Kinshasa: 4 dead in student protests 0
Three students and a police officer have died in the southeastern of the Democratic Republic of the Congo during weekend clashes at a protest over water and power outages, according to an updated death toll by the presidency.
The violence was sparked after a large area, including Lubumbashi university, was left without water and electricity for three days because of damage caused to vital cables and pipes by torrential rains.
The students were also demonstrating over higher fees.
Clashes broke out on Sunday after police used tear gas and warning shots to try to disperse crowds of students returning from the governor’s residence in Upper Katanga.
“The provisional figures established by officials report four deaths, including three students and a policeman,” said Vital Kamerhe, chief of staff of new president Felix Tshisekedi, in a statement.
Tshisekedi was sworn in last Thursday, marking DR Congo’s first peaceful handover of power but only after chaotic and bitterly disputed elections.
Runner-up Martin Fayulu has dismissed the result as a stitch-up between Tshisekedi and outgoing president Joseph Kabila, who ruled DR Congo for 18 years.
The police officer who “ordered to shoot the peaceful students without warning” will be brought before a military court “to face the rigor of the law,” the statement said.
It added that increases to academic fees paid by the university’s 10,000 students had been “suspended.”
Water and electricity supplies have been restored to the university campus, according to students.
Earlier police reports had said one student was shot dead and a police officer died after being hit by an anti-riot vehicle.
(Source: AFP)