Sudan raises minimum wage by 700%

On Wednesday, the Sudanese Ministry of Finance raised the minimum wage from SDG 425 to SDG 3,000, the largest increase in the history of the Civil Service in the country. Economists criticise the Ministry's policies.

The salaries of civil servants will be increased by an average of 569 per cent, the ministry stated. The raise will start this month according to the new salary structure of the Civil Service. It will be paid with the salaries of May.

In early March, Minister of Trade and Industry Madani Abbas announced “unprecedented increases” of the salaries in the country to be implemented in April.

Economists at the Ministry of Finance’s Resistance and Change Committee however, criticised the policies of the Finance Ministry. They accused the ministry of failing its first real test, the challenge of the coronavirus pandemic.

In a conference on the current economic situation, held in Khartoum on Wednesday, the experts called for a comprehensive review of the Ministry's financial, economic and structural policies.

The ministry should disengage from the economic policies of the former regime headed by ousted President Omar Al Bashir. Revenues of companies belonging to military and security institutions should go directly to the general budget.

Dr Wael Fahmi, member of the Ministry’s Resistance and Change Committee, said that the policy of lifting subsidies that the Minister of Finance is talking about is the policy of the regime.

Husam Ismail, representative of the resistance committees active in the neighbourhoods, called for transparent bidding in the field of import and export.

“There are major import and export companies,” he said. “We should not choose one company. It is better to make a selection on the basis of bids, in particular with regard to the import of strategic goods.”

USD 1 = SDG 55.1375 at the time of posting. As effective foreign exchange rates can vary in Sudan, Radio Dabanga bases all SDG currency conversions on the daily middle US Dollar rate quoted by the Central Bank of Sudan (CBoS).

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