band-aid solution?

Sudan: Is the new cabinet a step forward or hollow promises?

By Eman El-Sherbiny

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Posted on February 25, 2021 17:23

US-Sudan © Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok speaks during a news conference in Khartoum, Sudan 2019 (AP Photo, File)
Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok speaks during a news conference in Khartoum, Sudan 2019 (AP Photo, File)

Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok has named a new cabinet in keeping with the Juba Agreement. But is this new government a genuine step towards meeting popular demands or simply a smoke screen for keeping the military in power?

On 10 February, Sudan’s new cabinet was sworn in by chairman of the Sovereignty Council General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Prime Minister Hamdok. The announcement of the new government was announced two days prior, with Hamdok naming 20 new ministers.

“This cabinet came as a result of a political consensus over a long period of discussions that took months, and we were all concerned about how to steer the country from the brink of collapse. As you have been observing in our regions, there remains many conflicts and challenges,” Hamdok said in his address. 

A new strategy? A band-aid?

Among those appointed in the new cabinet is a Darfurian rebel leader of the Sudan Revolutionary Front, Gebril Ibrahim, who is now finance minister. And Mariam Sadiq Al Mahdi, the Umma Party leader and the late Sadiq al-Mahdi’s daughter, is the new foreign affairs minister.

“The new cabinet is definitely an

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