Sudan: Authorities summon three leaders of the FFC on charges of "dishonesty"
Khartoum, Sudan (PANA) - Sudanese authorities have put behind bars three leading figures within the Force for Freedom and Change (FFC) on ground of “dishonesty” in handling assets, capitals, and properties retrieved from the deposed regime of Omar Bashir.
Those arrested include Khalid Omar, former Cabinet Affairs Minister, Wagdi Salih, a Spokesperson of the Forces for Freedom and Change, and Al Tayeb Osman, member of the FFC politburo.
“This is a political arrest cloaked with malicious legalized justifications," Omar Digair, President of the Sudanese Congress party, argued.
Magdi Salih and Osman are also members of the committee set after the success of the uprising in 2019 to dismantle the legacy of Omar Bashir’s regime, including retrieving capitals, real estates and other wealth illicitly gained by that regime (1989-2019).
However, a year later the same committee was accused by pro-Bashir forces of misusing its powers and using its leverage for settling political differences with islamists and any element who was not supportive of the nascent regime.
Omar Digair, the chair of the Sudanese Congress party (SCP), told a hurriedly called press conference on Wednesday that authorities have “arrested” three leading members of the FFC of which his party is a member.
The authorities said this was not an arrest but rather a legal summoning within the criminal procedures of the Sudanese penal code.
The committee was frozen after October 21, 2021, when Army commander in chief staged a coup, removing Prime Minister Hamdouk and his cabinet.
Lt.-Gen. Abul Fatah Al Burhan said what he stated was only a “corrective procedures” to rectify errors and blunders committed under Hamdouk and by Hamdouk’s political incubators.
One of the dissolved and frozen bodies was the committee co-chaired by Wagdi, alternate chair of the committee, and a leading member of the FFC.
Shortly after his police served him a note to show at a police station for interrogation, Wagdi who is also a lawyer by profession said he was “summoned” by authorizes for interrogation under article 177/2 of the Sudanese penal code, dishonesty, punishable by at least 15 years in jail and the death by hanging if convicted.
He avoided using the word arrest that his political colleagues have been using in the press conference and in their tweets.
The FFC told the press conference that they wanted to revitalize the demonstrations and peaceful confrontations until they bring the coup regime to its knees and “dumping it in the history’s dust pin”.
The FFC argued that the arrests of these three leaders and “dozens of others in Khartoum and outside Khartoum” from the FFC grass roots and field leaders, would have negative impact on the current initiative led by the United Nations to try find a common ground among the various Sudanese stakeholders and end the present political crisis in the country.
-0- PANA MO/VAO 9Feb2022
