‘Retreat is impossible!’ On revolutionary fidelity in Sudan

At dawn on October 25, the Sudanese people learned that the military had staged a coup, ousting the civilian authority that they had agreed to share power with. The people did not wait for any statements from the civilian or military leadership. Of their own accord, they assembled and marched through the streets of the capital and Sudan’s other cities. They built barricades and blocked main and side roads in many neighborhoods. All of this happened between 6 am and 8 pm. 

“The people are stronger, stronger. Retreat is impossible,” was the main chant ringing in the streets. 

Weeks before the coup, a group that splintered off from the civilian-rebel umbrella Freedom and Change Coalition (FCC) held a sit-in front of the presidential palace in Khartoum to demand that the military take control of the country in what it called “a return to the foundational platform of the December revolution.” Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the other generals did not steer very far off from that demand. The morning after the October 25 coup, Burhan stated that the military measures he put in place are but a corrective course for the revolution. 

The chant “retreat is impossible” was a direct affront to the false use of expressions such as “a return to the foundational platform” or “correcting the course of the revolution.” The chant was an expression of a people owning their own power, their own destiny. What is noteworthy here is not the retreat, nor the foundational platform, but the positionality of the person using either expression vis-a-vis the revolutionary situation. Returning to the foundational platform is a trick, not a revolutionary stance. It is similar to the stance that the Freedom and Change Coalition took in calling for a return to the constitutional declaration and power arrangements that existed before the October 25 coup. 

Since the April 2019 sit-in outside the Armed Forces headquarters, revolutionaries have come to realize that to “civicize” power is far more important and worthy of a fight than a simple call for democracy. Sudan’s history has been cyclical, following the structure of democratic rule → military coup → popular revolution → democratic rule. To break this vicious cycle and to fix the crisis of democracy once and for all, we had to return to the roots of the crisis, the most important of which is the relationship between the military and the regime. Here, “civicization” arose as a slogan What is noble in all of this is that the slogan broke out from inside the sit-in square, during those magnificent moments when the public knew that it can rule itself, that it can secure its own safety and food. 

For that reason, the call for “civicization” was not a simple, abstracted hope. It was an experiment that was forced upon reality. It was the foundational platform of the December revolution, upon which the three main “yeses” of the revolution (freedom, peace, justice) and the three “noes” (no negotiation, no partnership, no legitimacy) were instituted. 

In interpreting Alain Badiou’s description of democracy as the contemporary world’s biggest fetish, Slavoj Zizek stated that “democracy is the last thing we see before confronting the ‘lack’ constitutive of the social field.” In this formulation, we find the logic behind Burhan’s claim that the coup exists to “correct the course” of the revolution, the political unconscious of the FCC splinter group’s trick to “return to the foundational platform,” the narrow-mindedness of the FCC’s “return to the constitutional declaration,” and finally, the basis on which Hamdok was guided back into the position of prime minister to “restore the transitional path to sustainable democracy.” All of those articulations express a belief that a rearrangement of the superstructure of power is enough to resolve the conflict of social antagonism. As for the main actors, the resistance committees, they know that the end goal is civil power and the means to accomplish this is grassroots organization. This cohesion between end and means was courageously and honestly expressed by the resistance committees’ statement in the aftermath of the coup: “Our fate is to be the generation that pays the price of ending military coups once and for all, and we will not postpone this battle at any cost.” 

During a speech that followed the signing of the November 21 agreement, through which Hamdok was brought back as prime minister, he mentioned four main reasons for his decision: to end the bloodshed, to ease the internal and external bottlenecks and to restore the transition path toward sustainable democracy, to preserve the gains of the last two years, and to fortify the transitional civil transformation process by expanding the base of participation. But in response to an Al Jazeera reporter’s question as to why he returned to work with those he considers to have orchestrated a coup, Hamdok said that “choices in this world remain governed by what is possible.” And herein lies the Hamdokian deceit. First, the choices of the revolution, any revolution, are built upon the principle of “be realistic and demand the impossible.” And second, “what is possible” in Hamdok’s perception is the “possible” of counterrevolution both inside and outside Sudan. 

The counterrevolution at home sees no way around some kind of co-ruling arrangement with the military. As for the outside world — and especially within circles of the international community that supported Hamdok’s return and in fact froze financial support to Sudan until he returned to the executive office — democracy is a home for an investment-friendly climate, one that welcomes the transfer of surplus and that can create more sites for consumption. All of that will not happen by an economic reform plan that places Sudan on the map of neoliberal merit. And Hamdok is the only person who can solidify this democratic fetish, or in his words, who can “ease the internal and external bottlenecks.” 

If we look at peace and economy, two of the gains mentioned by Hamdok upon returning to the prime minister’s office, we will find that they were established upon this timid possibility. The Juba Peace Agreement was weak and limited to specifying a quota for power at the higher echelons, whereas the formation of the commissions responsible for reinforcing that power (territories, transitional justices, borders, etc.) was postponed. As for the economic reform solutions, they have wreaked havoc on a society deprived of its own endogenous capacities due to impoverishment policies, something that Ibrahim al-Badawi, Hamdok’s finance minister in the first government, acknowledged in an article written with Ishac Diwan. 

But so far, the cost of reforms has fallen largely on poor citizens. Instead of seeing a payout of a democratic dividend, the Sudanese people have seen inflation accelerate to 366 percent, the economy shrink for the third year in a row, and absolute poverty increase. 

We have to remember that the December revolution has been and still is a progressive battle, a forward-facing gaze, a deep and internal reevaluation of Sudan’s history, and a serious, genuine desire for the people to recapture power. From here, the slogan “retreat is impossible” is not addressing a specific time frame. It is not a refusal to retreat to certain past moments in the revolution (October 25, April 6, or even December 19). “Retreat is impossible” means that retreat is impossible insofar as it is a retreat to those days when the people were deprived of their own power. As for “the people are stronger, stronger, and retreat is impossible,” it is an expression of Sudan’s new independence day. 

This invention of power, this belief in power, this courage and pride in being powerful are the essential steps to create a new Sudan. These are the great positions upon which fidelity to the revolution and the errors of its course can be determined, as well as the social actors responsible for “correcting” that course. 

Yes, we do need powerful thinking to move from potentiality to actuality, but we also desperately need to think about the identity of those who pose this question and situate them in the context of the “correct” revolutionary course. Contrary to what Hamdok said, the question of how to rule Sudan is inseparable from the question of who rules Sudan, at least during this stage.