Lessons from Sudan's Haphazard Hudud Model NST

2010

The conclusion of the so-called Comprehensive Peace Agreement1 in January 2005 and the adoption of a new constitution for the Sudan in July 2005 – which expressly incorporates the Comprehensive Peace Agreement2 – marked the end of a 20-year civil war between the central government in Khartoum and various rebel movements in the southern parts of post-colonial Sudan, most notably the Sudan’s People Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A).3 As a device to resolve Sudan’s north-south conflict, the Interim National Constitution of the Republic of Sudan attempts to alter the prevailing system, superseding the 1998 Constitution of the Sudan.4 The very name of the instrument calls atten-

Verfassung und Recht in Übersee, 2018

After the final agreement on peace between the government of Sudan and South Sudanese Sudan People’s liberation Army was reached in 2004, the Sudanese government faced a dilemma. It could not present the agreement as anything but a total ideological capitulation. The peace agreement provided for an interim secular state, which meant that the government’s leading ideological base of support – political Islamism, defined in the Sudan as support for the Sharia, known in Sudan as the September laws. The Sudanese version of the Sharia was imposed on Sudan in September 1983 without consulting the population by the country’s military ruler at the time, Gaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry. Having fought a war in the name of religion, the peace agreement proved very problematic for the government. The solution was in Northern Secessionism – the idea that once the South gets its independence, the North would be free to return to its cultural and religious policies which could be pursued more freely due to the absence of the Southerners. The slogan that the Sharia was safe was unfurled and used to deflect criticism. After the South’s departure, however, Sudan has not known peace and the ideas of the Northern Secessionists have not led to a united country or to peace in the Sudan. It is the aim of this short paper is to suggest some reasons behind the failure of the Northern Secessionist approach. In essence, the approach failed because of the ethnic diversity of the North itself, economic hardship, and the persistence of vast regional differences in the distribution of wealth. Letting the South go did not solve these problems and the Sudan has shown itself very vulnerable to the Arab Spring and while the Islamist government seems to have survived the first wave of protests in 2011 and 2012, the loss of the South with the oil revenues it provided has led to the loss of subsidies. The loss of subsidies has in turn led to wider protests marked with an increase in the number of deaths among the protesters and a cut in internet service and telephony over the last few months

Sharia Incorporated

This chapter maps the Sudanese experience around the application of elements of the shari´a from early Islamisation in the sixteenth century to early 2010. It shows how the Sudanese legal system has been shaped by a variety of sourcesfrom customary law and shari´a law to Turko-Egyptian law, British colonial law, and modern Egyptian civil law, to name some of the most important sources. In a second part, the chapter offers an analysis of the role of the shari´a in recent Sudanese legislation: in the constitution, in family and inheritance law, and in the fields of criminal law and economic law. A section on human rights and international obligations further demonstrates where Sudanese shari´abased legislation clashes with the human rights obligations of the Sudan. Taken as a whole, shari´a application has been expanding from 1983-1985 with a new stimulus as of 1989/1991 with the advent of the present military-Islamist regime. At this juncture, after more than twenty years of military-Islamist rule, expansion of shari´a application has clearly come to a standstill for the time being. Given the threat of Southern Sudan breaking away in addition to the Darfur and other conflicts, shari´a application is not a top priority for the Sudanese regime in 2010. Blood money and retribution No Islamic criminal law in the South Public Order Act 5.8 Economic law Islamic finance Zakat 5.9 Human rights obligations Legal contradictions between the shari´a and human rights in national and international law 5.10 Conclusions Diversity of legal systems that influenced the Sudan Resistance in the North and in the South Contradictions with human rights conventions Perspectives for the future Notes Bibliography

2003

Historical introduction to the subject of ijtihad 4.1 Defining the historical meaning and purpose of ijtihad 4.2 Ijtihad during the 8 th century C.E. 4.3 Ijtihad during the 9 th century C.E-The closure of the gates of ijtihad31 II THE FIELD STUDY Introduction to the Sudan 5.1 The Sudan 5.2 Islam, Islamic law and ijtihad in the Sudan 5.2.1 7 th to 17 th century 5.

Zeitschrift für Recht & Islam, 2020

European Scientific Journal, 2014

Islam is more than a religion, it encompasses faith, culture, law and the social order. Islam proposes a society of righteousness and justice. Criminal behaviour is not tolerated in the Islamic order of society. Criminal behaviour is breach of God's sovereignty, hence stiffer penalties are prescribed. This paper examines hudud punishments in Islamic penal system, and agitates for the reformation of Islamic criminal jurisprudence. While it is reasonable to punish offenders, and violators of normative principles, it is the opinion of this paper that punishments that are prescribed in municipal penal code should at least conform to international criminal jurisprudence.

Contributions in Black Studies, 1997

HE PEOPLES of southern Sudan have suffered nearly two centuries of colonial rule under the Turko-Egyptian, the Mahdiya, the Anglo-Egyptian, and the post-independence northern regimes. There is little need to repeat yet again this rather long history. Attention is only called here to the activities and policies of these colonial regimes which have contributed to the cleavage between the predominantly Muslim North and non-Muslim South. The history ofthe Islamic conquest and Arabization ofnorthern Sudan was a gradual and incremental process. From the seventh century on, Arab invaders from Egypt moved southward to the richer lands beyond the inhospitable Nubian expanse and forced deals on local rulers who undertook to assist Arab merchants financially and allow the preaching ofIslam. Many ofthe Arabs settled among the sedentary riverian communities in Sudan, taking up cultivation on the fertile alluvial soil. Others moved westward into the savanna regions of what is today known as Darfur and Kordofan and became cattle keepers. Wherever they settled, the Arabs blended with the local cultures, intermarried freely with the different Mrican indigenous inhabitants, and gradually introduced Islam and the Arab culture. Some indigenous tribes, like the Nuba of Kordofan, the Fur of Darfur, and the Beja of the Red Sea Hills, resisted Arab incursion into their respective homeland. In due time, however, they succumbed to the force ofthe new invaders and accepted Islam and learnt to speak Arabic, but retained their languages and cultures. Staunch resisters were killed, enslaved or fled elsewhere. By the fourteenth century much ofnorthern Sudan was transformed into an overwhelmingly Arabized and Islamized society and three Muslim states had emerged: Sennar on the Blue Nile; Kordofan in the middle, west of the White Nile; and Darfur to the west. The Arab penetration deep into southern Sudan did not occur until the early nineteenth century.

After the end of British colonization and three internal wars, the Republic of the Sudan’s modern leadership must redefine the new nation’s legal identity. While having a long history of weak laws under British rule, the majority Muslim nation’s leadership has replaced the old legal system with sharīʿah law. There is a fear in the international community, which has witnessed the nation’s ethnic strife (particularly the persecution of minorities), that: (a) Islamization and Arabization are movements which disenfranchise non-Muslim citizens and (b) present day Sudanese sharīʿah is excessively cruel. This paper chronicles how substantive law is the ultimate tool for framing society (and therefore people). It also concludes, thus, that substantive law has the ultimate liberating and suppressive power. Using a phenomenological approach to ethics, this paper gives an explanation for the development of human rights and prospects for the growth of human rights in Sudan. Also, this paper uses critical theory to investigate the potential social implications of postcolonial Sudanese constitutional law, including a prospective Qurʾanic rights dialectic for Sudan to reclaim its authenticity.​