Ali Al Haj denies Bashir’s charge of embezzling from Darfur road project

The Sudanese president and one of his former ministers have exchanged harsh words. Dr. Ali Al Haj Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the Popular Congress Party, forcefully denied corruption charges levelled at him by President Omar Al Bashir. The Sudanese leader recently repeated long-standing accusations that Ali Al Haj, a former official, had stolen from money allocated for the Western Salvation Road Project. The Western Salvation Road, which has never been completed despite planning since 2003 or earlier, is supposed to stretch from Khartoum to El Geneina once completed. The government presents the project as a way of developing Sudan’s westernmost region. The road’s name is a reference to the cultural and political programme of the current regime, which used to call itself the “National Salvation” government. Al Bashir said that Ali Al Haj took 50% of the share of the sugar quota from the states of Darfur for a period two years. These funds were meant for the construction of the Salvation Road, he said. In an interview with Radio Dabanga, Ali Al Haj denied the accusation. He described the accusation as unsubstantiated and “nothing new”. He disclosed to Radio Dabanga that he had earlier challenged President Al Bashir in Khartoum to take the matter to the judiciary to prove the charges, but President Al Bashir did not do it. Ali Al Haj is from Darfur. He was formerly a top financial manager within the Islamist regime. He served also as a government negotiator at peace talks with Southern rebels and as a minister of federal affairs. He has written that he was part of the road project as the head of a people’s committee to attract popular support for the project. His involvement in the project probably ended a number of years ago. In recent years he has remained a top lieutenant of Hassan Al Turabi, the former ideological leader of the current regime, who split from Bashir in 1999.