First Enemy (1-3) ✍️ Rashan O'Shea

Fate seems to have turned against Sudan as it struggles against violent aggression in the midst of an unprecedented political storm, the claws of its disobedient sons reaching out to gnaw at what remains of well-being in its exhausted body.

I believe the correct name for Sudan is “the land of opportunities.” Any opportunist who aspires to amass great wealth has found what he was looking for in these difficult times.

Sudan is engaged in an open confrontation on several fronts. The seeds of war were sown and nurtured years ago, and what happened on April 15 is only the continuation of a long journey that made the Holocaust inevitable.

The responsibility will hang on the neck of its owners. There are enough sins committed against this people. Nothing excuses anyone from getting out of this tragedy.

The economic collapse is the result of the deterioration in the value of the national currency that we know today. Its causes are multiple, but the most important and striking are three:

First: Before the war, the Central Bank of Sudan had a contract with the Emirati “currency” company to print the Sudanese pound, and the company received the “plates” and the fees, and in fact, a huge amount was printed when the Bank of Sudan demanded that it hand over the money, procrastination began.

The company was contacted several times by official email, and the response was negative. After that, the country's leadership learned that Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of the Emirates, to which Amlat Company belongs. ordered not to send the cargo to the Sudanese government.

The Bank of Sudan has not recovered from the shock of holding its national currency stocks in the Emirates, in addition to the looting by the Rapid Support Militia of the Sudanese Printing Company (currency), which forced the Ministry of Finance to borrow from the Central Bank to pay the salaries of the regular forces and the civil service, especially after the cessation of about (85%) of income.

Second: The other case concerns a group of businessmen (we will come back to this in detail), who took advantage of the financial distress that the country was going through, monopolized the importation of certain strategic goods, including fuel, and amassed enormous wealth.

The “petrol” and “gasoline” ships are anchored at the docks of Port Sudan until their owner recovers their value on the black market. It does not matter if the pound collapses or its value reaches (10) thousand to the dollar. because the citizen will buy fuel at the current dollar value.

This mafia controls the oil and its crocodiles try to swallow all the officials who are confronted with their crimes, who have money and who maintain close relations with the authority.

The Bank of Sudan has demanded that the sector be heavily regulated so that suppliers stop importing by buying foreign currency on the black market, but the finance ministry has insisted on liberalisation.

One of the businessmen was so brazen that he threatened a government official who refused to give him a bank loan because he had not committed to repaying a previous loan. He incited the press to attack him and spent huge sums of money on clowns on social media to assassinate his character.

All these crimes are paid for by the displaced and refugee people, with their daily livelihood and their future.

After fierce fighting, the Central Bank of Sudan managed to develop policies that limit the expansion of this mafia, dismantle its control over oil products and control the exchange rate.

By creating a joint portfolio of strategic goods between him and the Bank of Khartoum worth one billion dollars, thus closing the door to the greed of importers.

The new policies of the central banks amount to “closing the valve” in the face of this mafia, and the most affected by it are the monopolies of fuel imports, because they cause the collapse of the national currency in exchange for foreign currency, and at the same time they reap huge profits by selling fuel at high prices, while the citizen loses twice, with the consequence that the price of raw materials has deteriorated and fuel prices have climbed at abnormal rates due to the greed of the importers.

The strategic commodity portfolio will provide dollars to import fuel at its real price, which will generate a double benefit by stabilizing the sterling exchange rate and fixing real fuel prices.

The Central Bank continued to struggle to resolve this economic chaos, until its efforts were crowned with relative success, linked to the decision to constitute the portfolio.

Reserving an important seat in the civil service is one thing, but reserving an important seat in history is another. History is an eraser that can only be resisted by those who leave fingerprints that cannot be erased, until history writes him as a leader and not as a civil servant whose appeal will age if he loses his office and seals.

Third: The role of the customs authority in the destruction of the national economy. We will return to this in detail in the next article.

My love and respect

The article has been published First Enemy (1-3) ✍️ Rashan O'Shea First on Filet Zoll.