Sudan’s Council of Ministers passes draft bill on Darfur governance system

The Council of Ministers chaired by Prime Minister Abdallah Hamdok endorsed the Darfur Regional Governance System Act on Tuesday.

In various press statements, Minni Minawi, the newly appointed governor of Darfur, congratulated the Sudanese people in general and the people of Darfur in particular on the endorsement of the draft bill, “based on the Constitutional Document”.

He said the Council of Ministers will refer the Darfur Governance Act to the upcoming joint meeting of the Transitional Sovereignty Council and the cabinet “to be signed in the nearest time”, as the Sudan News Agency (SUNA) reported yesterday.

During the peace negotiations between the Sudanese government and a number of Sudanese rebel movements in the South Sudanese capital of Juba (that started in September 2019), the Khartoum government agreed to cancel the borders between the now five Darfur states, and restore the western part of the country to one Darfur region.

The main outcomes of the Juba Peace Agreement, signed on October 3 last year, were integrated in the 2019 Constitutional Document in the same month. Some six months later, the government agreed on the appointment of a governor for Darfur. On April 29, Minni Minawi, leader of a breakaway faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement, was appointed governor of the Darfur region.