‘Leaving Omdurman’ – Saad Obeid about the first months of war in Sudan (2)

Dr Saad Yousif Obeid, professor in theatre at the Sudan University, had to flee his home in Omdurman after war broke out between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in mid-April 2023. In El Gedaref, eastern Sudan, and later in Cairo, Egypt, he wrote about his and his son’s experiences on the 99^th day of the war, “maybe the blackest of our days ever”, and what made him decide to leave.

After Radio Dabanga obtained the first version of The Disaster, a book Obeid wrote about the first five months of the war, during which he and his youngest son stayed at their home in old Omdurman, it was decided to translate parts of the text, written in Arabic. Sharing Obeid’s memories means sharing the experiences of many Sudanese in areas occupied by the RSF, who lived through the same dangers, mental and physical assaults, perhaps even worse.

Radio Dabanga published Obeid’s account of Black Day on Thursday, November 21. Today, we present his second account, about what happened to him and his son after this day, and what made them finally decide to leave their beloved home in old Omdurman.

Obeid and his son managed to reach Wad Madani after a long, arduous journey, where he joined his daughter and her two children who had sought refuge in the city since the start of the war. From there, Obeid travelled to El Gedaref and his youngest son to Port Sudan. His eldest son earlier managed to reach the Gulf, where he works.

After about three months, in December, his daughter, a psychotherapist who was helping displaced women in Wad Madani, was forced to flee again when the RSF took control of a large part of El Gezira, and joined her father in El Gedaref. They travelled together to Port Sudan, and from there to Cairo, where they are now living, registered as refugees.

While relating about the incidents, Obeid hardly refers to the RSF but uses the word “invaders”. He chose to do so because after the paramilitaries had occupied the capital, allied bandits and vagabonds, attracted by ample opportunities to plunder, followed them. The author did not always understand what “the invaders” were saying, and explained to Radio Dabanga that among them were men from countries west of Sudan who followed “their brothers of the RSF” to profit from the war.

The Disaster

by Saad Yousif Obeid

Before Black Day, I was happy with my daily routine. Each day, I talked to my friend on the phone my friends. With musician and singer Abu Araki El Bakheet who lives in the neighbourhood, I would exchange news. I talked with poet and dramatist Hashim Siddig about the situation in neighbouring Banat and listened to his learned analyses of the situation. I enjoyed the calls of Mekki Senada, and those of my friends Osman El Badawi, Adel Harbi, and others who urged me to leave my house in old Omdurman.

I did not feel idle. A part of my day, I was busy looking for flour to make bread and for vegetables for cooking stew, and often saw invaders searching for houses abandoned by its residents, in order to plunder them. This did not distract me from continuing my research that I had started before the war erupted. I had also agreed with my friends El Rasheed Eisa and El Bakheet to write a documentary drama script depicting the events of the war, which we all thought would not last very long.

During the first few months of the war, we were helping each other in the neighbourhood, and together, we were able to solve food and water shortages. In this way my son and I were able to hold on in my humble home for about five months. I had never thought of abandoning my house, even if they replaced it with a palace. My wife left our world after she put her mark on every brick. It is a blessing of Allah that she was spared from having to live through these violent events.

The Black Day and the subsequent incidents, however, played a conclusive role in our decision to leave Omdurman.

That fateful day, I lost my telephones and thus I lost communication with the world around me. I lost their voices, which helped reduce my feelings of loneliness. Talking to my friends made it easier for me to be humiliated by the ugly monsters around us.

I also lost my laptop, which was my treasury and lab, in which I used to spend most of my days and parts of the nights. I lost the texts I was working on, including a play and a book on the history of theatre in Sudan I had started working on the year before.

By losing my lab, I became unemployed. I had no other job but to watch invaders passing by in our street, answer the same questions over and over again, and watch them break open doors of houses in order to steal the most valuable contents.

They left the doors open for thieves from the neighbourhood: professional city thieves and women gangs. Rumours say that the professional thieves were released from prisons after the war erupted. The invaders allegedly sell stolen goods to them and let them further plunder whatever they want. The women gangs entered the looted houses to take with them what is left, such as clothes and kitchen utensils.

‘Be prepared’

These days we had learned to observe those entering the street well, to get an idea about who would confront us. If they were carrying firearms, they would be invaders, and we had to be mentally prepared to answer their often-stupid questions. If they carried machetes, they were gangsters, who would not be worrisome if we did not interfere. Those unarmed or carrying sticks were often ordinary people on their way to and from the nearby firewood market.

Many neighbours had already left the place, and the remaining men used to gather under the big neem tree in our street. On a morning, when we were sitting under the neem tree as usual, a middle-aged, burly man passed, carrying a fan. He greeted us and said: “Guys, I am not a thief. I swear I’m not a thief!”

When none of us answered him, he continued in a shaky voice, almost crying: “I’m a blacksmith. I swear to God, I haven’t earned money for months. I sold everything in the house to feed my children. They haven’t eaten for two days.” He was silent for a while. “Yes, I took this fan from a home to sell it and buy them something to eat. Should I let them die?”

He did not wait for our answer and left. We all remained silent for a while.

Another morning, a man dressed in African clothes appeared from a distance, together with a boy, about ten years old. We thought they were heading towards the charcoal market, but when they approached, we noticed that the man was carrying a firearm on his shoulder. He aimed his gun at our faces and shouted at us in an Omdurman accent: “Stand up!”

We stood up.

“Why are you sitting here?”

“We live here.”

“Why didn’t you leave like the others?”

“Where should we go?”

He then looked towards a car in a parking cage in the street and asked me:

“Bring the car to me!

I told him that the motor would not start.

“I’ll start it,” he said. “Give me the key!”

“It doesn’t have a key.”

“Is there a car without a key? Stop talking nonsense and give me the key.”

“Brother, do you think that if this car could ride, I would have stayed here till now?

“Open this cage for me.”

We opened the cage. He entered and walked around the car. He seemingly did not know what to do and shouted at us: “Move, in front of me.”

“Where do we go?”

“To the soldiers’ post.”

We all moved, but he stopped me: “You, old man, stay here!”

I watched them leaving until they reached the tarmac road. Before I could think about what to do, my friends returned. They told me that an RSF commander saw them and asked what was going on. “These are army intelligence,” the captor replied, whereupon the commander replied: “Brother, these are ordinary civilians. Let them go, and you, you stay where you are!”

Later we learned that this man lived nearby and had been mobilised by the RSF.

Extortion

Straightforward stealing and plundering had become common, but we also experienced extortion, a quick and easy way to obtain money.

An invader came to the house of one of my neighbours and told him that he was wanted for questioning as he was suspected of being a member of Military Intelligence. Our neighbour had no choice but to follow him. Before they had gone far, the invader told him that if he paid a specified sum of money, he would be free to return home.

“I don’t have money,” the neighbour said.

“You do.”

“Search me.”

“You have it on your bank account. Transfer it through ‘bankak’ [a banking app] to this number.”

The transfer was done and my neighbour returned home.

Another neighbour who owned a new transport vehicle became victim of double extortion. One afternoon, a group of invaders entered his house and took the car with them at gunpoint.

We had become used to be robbed of our belongings, gazing between loot and a gun barrel pointed at your head or chest. New was that while our neighbour was trying to forget his stolen vehicle, another group came that promised him to return the car to him if he handed them a few billion pounds. The neighbour compared the amount with the value of the car and gave them the money. They returned the car, but the man’s joy did not last long, as a third group came the following day and stole the same vehicle again.

Extortion entered a more dangerous curve, when families in the neighbourhood were threatened and told that one of their girls would be taken for questioning, on vague accusations. If the relatives would pay the invaders a few billion pounds, the girl would be spared. The head of the family would contact all his acquaintances, borrow the money, and pay the amount. Usually, such a family then left, often on foot, leaving behind all their belongings.

Shot

After Black Day, a Saturday, I did not sleep for two nights. On Monday afternoon, the weather was cloudy, which was normal for the end of July. I was lying in my bed to get some rest. Suddenly I heard shots and the shouting of women and children in the house of my neighbour, a university lecturer.

Quickly, I ran outside and was surprised to see two youths from the neighbourhood chasing one of the invaders with their batons. I could not believe my eyes: a gunman fleeing from batons?

I entered the house and found my neighbour injured. Another neighbour was giving him first aid. I understood that the invaders had come asking for the key to a vehicle that my neighbour does not own. The man I saw running away had shot at the ground and shrapnel hit my neighbour’s body. When others came in, he panicked and ran away.

We were accustomed to raids of invaders during the day, so we used to spend quiet nights except for the sounds of gunshots and those of local gangs plundering abandoned houses. But this changed.

One night, when we gathered after evening prayer, a small truck stopped nearby and a large group of invaders, most of whom were drunk, got out. They searched us at gunpoint, seized telephones from those who still had them –all of which were small phones except one– and told us to stand next to the wall.

Some of the invaders guarded us. Others guarded the entrances to the street, and the rest broke into our houses. From our home, they took away screens, air conditioners, and other movables that acquaintances had brought to us for safety before they left. They thought that the invaders were only plundering empty houses.

During the transport of movables to their truck, a neighbour returned to his home from a visit elsewhere. One of the guards shot at him. Luckily, he missed.

When the rest heard the shots, they rushed towards their vehicle. They returned the small telephones to their owners, kept the smartphone and the other stolen goods, and left.

We discovered that the owner of the smartphone was collaborating with the invaders when he passed by the following morning carrying his smartphone. It made us less confident regarding the other residents of the neighbourhood.

‘Jellabi’

The morning after the incident with the drunk, three invaders came to me. Before, they had tried to force me to hand over the keys to the vehicle parked outside. This time they used a different way with me. Their commander entered the house and said to me: “By God, uncle, you look like my father. When I see you, I remember my father.”

I looked at him suspiciously, but he continued: “Uncle, this car is causing you problems. Why don’t you want to get rid of it?”

I continued to stare at him without answering his questions. He got angry and snarled at me: “You know that after this war, there won’t be a jellabi [northern Sudanese*] left here.” He continued calmly again: “So, tell me honestly what you want this car for?”

“Brother, I told you before this car isn’t mine and I don’t have the key.”

“I can buy it from you for SDG100 million**. Do you have anything else to say?”

“I told you can take it for free.”

“Without a key?”

“Drag it.”

“This car cannot be dragged.”

“So, what can I do for you?”

He took a long breath and said: “That’s it, uncle, promise me that you will search for the key, and if you find it, you will not give it to anyone. I will pass by every day.

“Okay.”

Not much later, one of them came out of the house carrying a screen. The commander intervened and ordered him to return the screen. The three of them moved away but the screen thief returned.

I asked him where he was going. “You’ve just been inside.”

“I forgot my whip inside. Why didn’t you remind me?”

“Of what should I remind you?”

“You jellabi’s are …….”.

He threw a word in my face, which I had never heard before. Yet, the stark hatred on his face spoke for itself. He quickly entered the house, came out carrying the screen, and drove off with it.

The next day, two of them visited me again. The screen thief was absent.

The commander greeted me, and asked: “Uncle, what did you do for me?”

“Regarding what?”

“The car key.”

“I didn’t find it.”

He went to the water jar, filled the cup, and before he drank, he said:

“Uncle, your friend has died.”

“Who is my friend?”

“The one who took your screen.”

“How did he die?”

“He tied the screen to his motor and drove away. Then others shot him in his head.”

He told us this without showing any trace of emotion, drank the water, and left.

Disappeared

In the following weeks, the number of departures increased significantly. Many of the men also left. The remaining people in the neighbourhood could now be counted by the fingers of two hands. Only me, my son and two other men in our street stayed, and we often slept elsewhere.

Solidarity between the remaining residents grew during the repeated long power and water outages, with the sound of shelling and shooting in the background, and attacks by flies during the day and mosquitoes at night.

New, fiercer invaders appeared.

On the morning of a Tuesday in mid-August, we were sitting with the remaining residents of the neighbourhood under the neem tree, having breakfast that consisted of cooked lentils and bread we had made at home from flour that we had risked getting from a shop in the vicinity that was still open.

A friend of my son from the El Doha neighbourhood on the southern bank of Khor [creek] Abu Anja joined us. He had taken refuge in our neighbourhood when the invaders occupied El Doha.

After the meal and performing noon prayer, we exchanged news about burglaries and rumours about negotiations between the warring parties. The topics of today were duplicates of yesterday’s topics and the words we used came from our new slang dictionary, like shafshafa [burglaries or loot], arad [flee], jahiziya [RSF], or um guroun [a girl or woman].

I felt tired and entered the house. I carried some of the water that we had collected from the heavy rains the day before to the bathroom and washed my body that had not been blessed with water for days. I lied down on my bed to get some rest.

A few minutes later, however, I heard loud voices from under the neem tree, and I rushed outside, where I found two men arguing about a topic not worth mentioning. I got the idea they were trying to occupy themselves with any topic, to forget the situation we were in.

I also noticed my son’s absence and was told that he had gone with his friend to El Doha to get some valuables from his friend’s home. I blamed the neighbours for letting the youngsters cross the creek to El Doha and decided to search them. When I reached the tarmac road, fierce fighting broke out at the creek. Missiles of various shapes, colours, and sounds were flying everywhere, so I returned, taking a step or two, stop to listen where the shooting went, and proceed again, a habit that we had gotten used to.

The violence continued for a while. Silence prevailed under the neem tree. Time passed. The sun went down, the fighting stopped, but my son and his friend did not come back. My worries increased, though the people left in the neighbourhood tried to convince me that the two boys must have gone into hiding when the clashes began, that they could not go out at night for fear of snipers, and they would inevitably return with sunrise.

After dawn prayer, I absent-mindedly prepared my morning coffee and decided to go to the nearby RSF base to ask them about the fate of my son and his friend. When I reached the tarmac road, I heard shouting in an unknown language but understood that I had to stop.

The man looked terrifying. He wore both modern and traditional clothes, all very dirty. He had two bullet belts around his neck, and a series of amulets tied at his waist. He was wearing a kadamool (scarf covering the face) so I only saw his red eyes.

He pointed his weapon at my forehead and said something I did not understand. He started shouting at me and spittle was flying from his mouth. I did not grasp a word of what he was saying except that I had to return, which I did and sat on a chair in front of our house, watching the empty street.

Threats

A person appeared. He wore clean clothes and nothing on his head. When he approached, I noticed that he was carrying a weapon on his shoulder. He shouted at me: “He guy, what are you doing here?”

“This is my home.”

“Why are you sitting outside?”

“The electricity is cut off.”

“Electricity? Are you prepared to convey this information to intelligence?

I began to doubt his intentions. “Electricity and water have been interrupted for many days.”

“What are these chairs for?”

“For the people from the neighbourhood.”

“The people from the neighbourhood or from the army?”

“People from the neighbourhood.”

“Who lives with you?”

“My son.”

“Where is he?”

“I don’t know, but he may have gone searching for bread.”

He stuck the barrel of the weapon to the back of my head and shouted:

“Move .. open the door and enter in front of me.”

He went through the rooms one by one. He asked me about the furniture and books piled on the floor:

“Who did this?”

“Your guys.”

“Our guys? What are you talking about?”

“I don’t know but they come every day. They enter the house, take whatever they want and leave again.”

“What did they take? Weapons?”

“No, but they took telephones, laptops, screens and …”

“Enough … Move in front of me.”

We got out of the house. He was the only invader who left our house without carrying any of its contents with him. He was clearly looking for people.

On the street, he suddenly turned to me and asked:

“Tell me honestly. Everybody left, and you stayed, doing what?”

“This is my house.”

Suddenly furious: “Don’t you tell me this is your house. I want you to confess. Why are you and your son staying here until now?”

“Where could we go?”

Then a muscular man wearing pants and a black undershirt arrived. He did not carry a weapon. He tore a big branch from the neem tree and began to clean it of its leaves.

The first man continued: “Better to admit so we won’t use force with you.”

“Admit what?” I raised my voice: “I told you. I have nothing to do with anybody. I don’t have a phone and there is no …”

He interrupted me: “Shut up.”

The other was ready to hit me with the branch. The first one, however, grabbed his colleague and said: “He is an old man, don’t hit him. We take him there and let them deal with him.”

Suddenly, he then pointed his weapon at one of the opposite houses and asked me:

“Who lives in that house?”

“It is empty.”

The men went to the house, had a look without entering, and left.

Detained

I breathed a sigh of relief and sat on a chair, wondering who they were. My neem tree friends arrived. We talked about what happened and concluded that my son and his friend were still alive, but held somewhere, and that this weird morning visit could have been part of the investigations related to their detention. Or maybe the boys were detained for a ransom, as had happened to others.

One of my friends kept repeating that a certain neighbour was behind the detention. We discussed the guy’s involvement until the man suddenly appeared.

He pulled a chair, sat on it, and said: “Peace be upon you.”

No one answered him except me.

“Hopefully you have good news about the boys,” he asked.

“There is no news. Do you have any?”

“I have been working on the issue since yesterday,” he said. “I know that they were held at the creek and taken to the large base in El Doha. From there they were transferred to the detention centre. They may be released soon.”

Asked from where he got this information, he answered: “By phone.

“I called a friend of mine who lives in El Doha next to the detention centre. He said he personally saw them being transported. I’m sure they won’t find anything on them. Just questions and they will release them. I will continue my efforts,” he said, and he left.

In the evening, friends brought beleela [boiled adzuki beans] and forced me to eat it. The two spoons I ate were the first food I ate since the afternoon the day before.

That night, I also did not sleep. I decided to leave and find out if the kids were in that prison, whatever it would cost me.

At dawn, electricity returned with a very strong current, so most of the bulbs in the house burned. The water came back, but the pressure was weak, so it took some time to fill the pots and buckets. Then I got dressed, intending to go out to the detention centre, but I felt extremely exhausted, so I lay down to get some rest first.

When I got up, put my passport in my pocket and made sure I did not have any money with me in case of searches at checkpoints. I heard knocking on the door and attempts to open it. Despaired, I expected invaders at the door.

I opened it and found my son and his friend in front of me. I quickly moved them inside and closed the door. They looked terrible, showing signs of beatings on their bodies. I gave them water. They washed themselves and went to sleep.

In the afternoon, they told me that they were held in El Doha and taken to the Omdurman City Hall. They talked about what happened in detention. They also confirmed our suspicions regarding this particular neighbour.

Forced to leave

It was clear that staying at home was becoming more dangerous each day and that our only option was to leave. I told my son’s friend to join his family that had fled earlier to another, safer neighbourhood, and sat down with my son to discuss the possibilities.

We could leave for Banat Gharb [west Banat], which was still under control of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). Our large family house is there, not far away from our home. The second option was to follow the tracks of most of the residents of our neighbourhood who fled to the army-controlled northern parts of Omdurman. We could also leave for Wad Madani, the capital of El Gezira, some 200 kilometres south of Omdurman, to join the rest of the family.

After deliberations, we decided to go to the family house in Banat West and wait there until things would calm down. We agreed with a rickshaw driver from the neighbourhood to take us to Banat early next morning.

We spent the night putting a few personal belongings in a few bags, as we did not want to raise suspicion at check points of the invaders. In the morning, after having waited a long time for the rickshaw to come, the driver came on foot. He had left his rickshaw at home and said that we would not be able to go that day.

“Why?”

“Fighting broke out since the early morning. Haven’t you heard it? It is shooting we hear every day, but this time there are snipers in El Doha. Better wait until things calm down a little before we’ll move.”

We returned the bags to the house and waited. However, clashes in El Doha have continued to erupt from time to time and going to Banat was impossible. Our neighbourhood enjoyed relative calm, and we almost forgot the idea of leaving.

Warning

Until the day an RSF officer passed by. He wore a regular military uniform and did not resemble the appearance and accent of the invaders we had become used to. He greeted us, sitting as usual under the neem tree, amicably: “Hello guys.”

“Hello .. Please sit down.”

He sat down. We were apprehensive, but he tried to make us feel at ease, and said: “Hopefully your water cooler contains water?”

“There is water, but it is warm.”

“Hot or cold, important there is water. I work in the south of Omdurman. There, it is difficult to find water.”

One of us filled a cup, handed it to him, and he drank it all in one gulp.

“Do you want some more?”

“Yes brother, I am very thirsty. I came on foot a long way. I came to your neighbourhood in search of the house of a relative.”

“What is his name?”

He mentioned the name and we described the house to him. He put the cup down and stood up: “May God protect you.”

He started moving, then stopped and whispered: “Guys, to be frankly, we have information that this area may soon be attacked. If this happens, we will bring in support troops that kill indiscriminately. So, guys, I advise you to get out of here!”

He left us in shock. We were not sure whether he was honest. Maybe it was another trick to make us leave our homes, but his warning certainly reminded us about our decision to leave.

The following afternoon, when we were sitting under the neem tree, we were attacked by a large group of invaders, of a kind we had never seen before. Half of the group surrounded us and accused us of harbouring a sniper, the others broke into the house.

They came out happily, carrying the wings of an old drone camera belonging to my eldest son, an old transistor radio that looks like a talkie-walkie, and an old receiver they found stored on the roof.

Their leader put them in front of me, and asked:

“Where is the rest of this drone?”

I replied: “This is a camera.”

Sarcastically he asked: “Camera?”

“A drone … It is a camera that can fly and take pictures from above.”

“You’re shooting at us with this drone. Where is the rest of it?”

“I told you these broken wings belong to a camera.”

Then he waved the radio and the receiver in my face and said: “What’s this? Do you use this to communicate with intelligence?”

“Brother, this is an old radio.”

“A radio?”

He moved away a little and made a phone call. Then he pointed with his hand to one of the houses opposite ours, and the second group climbed the wall and entered the house, searching floor after floor, while we were still guarded by the first group.

At that moment, a luxurious private car appeared, occupied by invaders in regular military gear. The commander rushed to the vehicle carrying the wings of the drone and the radio. He talked to the driver and after a few seconds, we saw the driver throwing the wings on the ground and moved away.

Our guards lowered their weapons and left. We breathed a sigh of relief. However, the incident strengthened the need to leave as soon as possible.

As the road to Banat was still fraught with danger, we decided to flee to Wad Madani. After asking around, we understood that we had to go to the Libya Market to be able to travel to the capital of El Gezira. The best way would be via the East.

‘Where from?’

I sat in the yard of the house and started thinking about how to leave without being noticed. Suddenly I heard voices outside. I hurried out to find a neighbour in front of his house tied with ropes by three invaders. One of them was hitting him with a kind of sword. They are demanding goods my neighbour was trading before the war.

As soon as I appeared, one of them shouted at me, threatening with his weapon: “Sit on the ground!”

I sat down. He stared at me: “Where are you coming from?”

I pointed to the house behind me: “From here.”

He then saw the others leaving and joined them. I went to my neighbour. His handcuffs were very tight, so we had to cut the ropes with a knife.

That afternoon, a group of invaders passed by without paying attention to us. One of them, however, turned and came back to us. He stared at one of our friends and asked him:

“Are you Ja’ali**?”

“No.”

“Guy, say you are a Ja’ali.”

“I told you I am not Ja’ali.”

“Don’t lie to me!”

“Why would I lie? If I were a Ja’ali, I would have said so. Which tribe are you from?”

He said proudly: “I am a Rezeigi.”

“Now if I told you to say that you are Sheigi, would you say so?”

He looked disgusted: “I would never say this .. never.”

“Okay, why you are telling me to belong to a tribe that is not mine?”

He looked at us with contempt and said: “All of you are jellabi’s.”

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* The word jellabi (plural: jellaba) traditionally referred to northern Sudanese (of Arab origin) itinerant merchants. Northerners were also slave traders. After the northern peoples (the so-called Riverain elite) politically came to dominate the African Sudanese living in the peripheries, the word developed into a purely pejorative term. Most members of the RSF have been recruited from Arab herders’ tribes in western Sudan, but a deep distrust remains towards the northern rulers’ in Khartoum who look down on all ‘black people’ in the peripheries, whom some elderly northerners still call ‘slaves’.

** The Ja’liyin or Ja’alin are a large tribe of Arab and Arabised Nubian clans in northern Sudan. Their homeland lies on both banks of the Nile from Khartoum to Abu Hamed in River Nile State. They are one of the three prominent Sudanese Arab tribes in the region –the others being the Sheigiya and Danagla– that form the ‘Riverain elite,’ trained by the British colonisers to (help) rule the country. Ousted dictator Omar al Bashir was a ja’ali. The Rezeigat, from which many RSF members hail, including the commanding Dagalo family, is a large Arab herders’ tribe, based in western Sudan, Chad, and Niger.