Sudan Government Orders Demolition of 10,000 Houses in Slum

By Heba Aly

Dec. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Sudan’s government ordered the destruction of as many as 10,000 homes in a slum outside the capital, Khartoum, as part of an urban planning program, a local administration official said.

The campaign forced thousands of people to live in makeshift shelters made of sticks and cloth on the fringes of the Mandela settlement, 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of Khartoum, said former residents including Mary Deng and Ahmad Abderahim. The slum was formed in the early 1990s by migrants from the western region of Darfur and southern Sudan.

“The demolition came with the agreement of the people,” Madut Wek, a spokesman for Mandela’s so-called popular committee, a state-backed local authority that administers the settlement, said on Nov. 29. “When you live in a camp, you’re not comfortable. You’re not settled.”

Human rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have previously accused President Umar al- Bashir’s administration of using dictatorial measures such as cracking down on the media and arbitrarily arresting dissidents to hold on to power.

Mandela, a series of crowded mud homes woven together by narrow sandy paths, has no streets, no state-provided electricity and no formal land ownership. Members of the popular committee said once demolition was complete, every resident with an identification card would be given a properly identified plot of land and homes would be rebuilt in an organized manner.

“This reorganizing will bring us water, electricity, transport,” Wek said.

4,000 Homes Destroyed

Francis Wani, a member of the popular committee, said 4,000 houses have already been destroyed and the remaining homes will be brought down in stages. The clearance began on the weekend of Nov. 22 and Nov. 23, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported on Nov. 29, without being more specific.

Ali Agab, legal aid coordinator at the Khartoum Center for Human Rights and Environmental Development, said the removal of residents of Mandela was one of a series of incidents in which the government was clearing land to sell to investors.

“After people have been living a long time in a certain area, after the land becomes of value, the government doesn’t care about where people go and how they will get services,” Agab said by phone from Khartoum. “They just kick people out.”

A spokesman at the Interior Ministry, which is responsible for the police, couldn’t immediately comment on the matter when called today in Khartoum.

Some residents said they were attacked by the police when they refused to move.

“If you refused to leave, they came with the bulldozer with you and your furniture inside,” said Deng, a mother of three, whose home was destroyed.

Residents said they feared they would not be allowed to return unless they could afford to pay the required sum and that their land would be sold to investors. They also expressed concern that their current living conditions may deteriorate.

“We’re worried about fires, about sickness, about criminals,” said Abderahim, a migrant from the Nuba Mountains in central Sudan. “If there is a fire, not one child will survive. These houses burn easily.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Heba Aly in Khartoum via Johannesburg at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Source:(Bloomberg)