Sudan and the Fear of The Unknown, By Dr Shadi Sabeh

In 2015 I walked into a Business center in Sudan to make copies of my PhD Thesis, the operator was excited on identifying me as a Nigerian.

He quickly expressed his envy for Nigerians who have had a change of President five times since the swearing in of Al-Bashir. He seemed so regretful to have had the same person in power for such a long time.

I looked around the shop; no generating set, no inverter, no solar panel, high speed internet service, free cold water and most of all a promising venture.

I drew his attention to the fact that in Nigeria he would need to have used a couple of strategies to provide power for his business as well as struggle with outrageous internet charges, he would sell water to customers and not have the luxury of offering it free of charge. He hardly believed the description of my dear Nigeria.

What do we really want?

Change of power or change from good to bad.

Walking the streets of Khartoum in the morning you would notice bread hanging at the doorstep of most homes waiting for anyone to pick up, the blazing sun is compensated with constant power supply and air conditioning sets available in most households.

Walk into shops, banks, hotels and other places and expect to be greeted with hibiscus tea free of charge. This you don’t get even in China.

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Economic sanctions have had a toll on the country but has succeeded in stimulating a deliberate emphasis on domestic industrialization and entrepreneurial independence.

I was amazed with the local production of air conditioning sets, pharmaceutical products, poultry produce and host of others.

Economic prosperity should be measured by real living standards of the populace and not growth percentages that don’t reflect on basic survival of the people. What is the use of a so-called growing GDP with hunger littered all over the place.

I visited America in 2015 and 2017 and gave charity to a good number of homeless poor Americans who constantly sleep hungry and have no hope of going through the day. These guys would have just been able to survive on the hanging loaves of bread had they migrated to Sudan.

Africans needs to wake up to the reality of the day and appreciate who they are and stop copying everything.

Sudan might have have just liberated themselves from the clutches of an “overstayed” President but the question remains…. What lies ahead?

I hope Sudan would move in a prosperous direction as the country slips into the “Unknown”.

Written by Dr Shadi Sabeh in 2019.