Working with communities in Bahr el-Ghazal, Southern Sudan

THE GREAT BETRAYAL by Ranald Boyle (Tim Atiep)

"The Great Betrayal - that's what I call it". So wrote Sefton Delmer, the Daily Express Special Correspondent from Khartoum on 12 February 1953. That same day the Anglo-Egyptian Agreement was signed in Cairo, which effectively 'sold the Southern Sudanese down the river', and at the same time gave Sudan immediate internal self-government. Independence was to follow within three years.

Many of us, administrators and others, who were serving in the Sudan at the time, felt that the British Government had abandoned its responsibilities to the Sudanese people (especially those in the South), in order to appease Egypt, whose government was demanding British withdrawal from her military bases in Cairo and the Canal Zone. I was at the time serving as a District Officer in the Gogrial area of Bahr el-Ghazal (one of three Southern provinces), and resigned in protest at the failure to provide the promised safeguards for the South to which the Southerners had agreed in the Draft Agreement. The final agreement omitted all such safeguards. The northern politicians, in thrall to financial temptations from Egypt and eager for power, disregarded the wishes of the Southerners and other outlying areas. Britain, fearful of trouble, opted for Sudan's sovereign right of independence and the security of her military bases, and did likewise. Appeasement was the order of the day. Past experience should have shown that, though Sudan's independence might be assured, the military bases were doomed. Most of us expected trouble, possibly civil war, in the South. At that time even unity with Egypt seemed likely.

Thus February 1953! So less than 55 years after the battle of Omdurman (1898), when the British and Egyptian forces defeated the Mahdi's bid to set up a fundamentalist Islamic state, ruled by fear, oppression and an iron-fist, Sudan was to be given to the grand-children of that regime. And now, 45 years on, in September 1998, with the centenary of Omdurman, another unelected and oppressive government in Sudan is attempting to impose again a fundamentalist Islamic regime on its unwilling people. Famine, civil war, slavery, abuse of human rights, suspected genocide, are rife. Such, over the years since independence, have been the fruits of British appeasement and withdrawal.

Britain has been blamed for many errors and omissions during her years in Sudan: failure sufficiently to develop the country; neglect of the South and marginal areas; a lack of awareness of social and economic progress; slowness in expanding communications; neglect of education, and so on. But it must be remembered that during those years, Britain was involved in two World Wars, an economic depression in the '30s and perpetual lack of funds. Even in 1953, Sudan's annual budget was a mere £E35,000,000 and with this an area the size of Western Europe had to be controlled. Our chief legacy to an independent Sudan was law, order, justice and sufficiency for all, our chief error was loss of nerve and a lack of will to stand up for our loyal friends when it came to the crunch. Our legacy over recent years has now all but been destroyed.

It is worth recording what one of the Bahr el-Ghazal chiefs said in Gogrial at the time of the February 1953 Agreement during Sefton Delmer's visit there. Here it is: "The Northerners say the British have done nothing for the South. But Southerners know what the British have done. Before the coming of the British, the Northerners were here. We were in the well. When the British came, they pulled us out of the well. Now the Northerners are coming again and want to do the same things they did to us so many years ago. The British have shown us many things. They have put down the fighting that used to destroy us, just as a man puts out a fire that devours his crops. They have done away with the strife and enmity that used to hold sway among us. While the British are here, certainly the Northerners keep the peace and behave as though they were our brothers. But years ago before the British came, the Northerners were the fire which burned us. If the British go away we shall have fear."

Prophetic words! But Britain refused to listen, abandoned safeguards, gave in to outside pressures and deserted her friends. Now after 42 years of independence, of which barely one third has been free from civil war and oppression, Britain, the United States and the Western democracies must do more to bring the present Sudan Government to reform its policies, negotiate peace with its own people and its neighbours and restore democratic elections before the country finally disintegrates. Britain's residual duty and responsibility is to take the lead and show the determination we lacked 45 years ago. One hundred years after Omdurman, what could be a better aim?

Published in The Daily Express 3rd September 1998. Sefton Delmer's original article, mentioned above, can be found here.

Click on the button to return to the top

Latest news | Archived news | Newsletters