Sudanese National Assembly discusses people’s livelihood

The National Assembly held a meeting in Khartoum on Monday, chaired by its Speaker Prof. Ibrahim Ahmed Omer, in the form of a committee, to discuss the issue of people's livelihood.

According to the official Sudanese News Agency (SUNA), a number of ministers, experts, academics and employers participated in the meeting. The Committee meetings are to continue for three consecutive days to forward a proposal for the resolution of the issue.

The Chairman of the Economic Committee at the National Assembly Prof. Ahmed Majzoub called for the state to complete the exit from the productive activity at all sectors and activities – direct and indirect – and not to compete with the private sector for the reform the economy.

In his paper on the people's livelihood Status Quo and Future Visions: A Proposed Plan to Improve People's Livelihood, Prof Majzoub urged allocation of resources to establish infrastructure by focusing on the production of priorities and the free economic zones besides giving priority to the support of the productive sector, calling on the state to lead strategic productive initiatives and to complete privatisation policy.

Banking system

He called for compelling the banking system to fund the priorities by giving incentives to the banks that finance the priority along with the establishment of portfolio to finance export goods.

The Chairman of the Economic Committee at the National Assembly called for the review of labour laws in order to keep balance in the contractual relations and gives the rights to the contracting parties in addition to the encouragement of human capital export policy in accordance with the reading and analysis of the demand for the Sudanese labour in the regional and global context, pointing to the importance of labour capacity building with the signing of treaties preserving the Sudanese labour rights.

He stressed development of clear guidelines regarding the foreign investment to ensure the benefit from it as well as standardization of the investment procedures system at the federal level.

The member of the Trade Union Yahiya Hassan called the National Assembly not to adopt the next year’s budget unless it includes increase of workers wage.

Prof Fathi Mohammed Khalifa called for the capability building of the traditional and to be trained to deal with the modern technological mechanisms.

Prof Mohamed Abdel-Majid pointed out that the employers in the industrial sector have been suffering from the problem of technical education, calling for giving attention to it, revealing that the lifting of fuel subsidies from the industrial sector had a negatively impacted the productivity.

Parliamentary study

A parliamentary study has revealed a significant gap between the cost of living and minimum wages for workers in Sudan.

The study has confirmed that the average family's monthly spending was SDG7,215 ($1,135) by 2016, while the minimum income does not exceed SDG425 ($67).

The study reports that the average monthly expenditure per capita for the year 2016 amounts to SDG2,476 ($390) for food and drink, SDG135 ($21) for housing, water and electricity, SDG40 ($6.30) for health care, SDG500 ($80) for transportation, SDG84 ($13) for communications, SDG126 ($20) for education, and SDG362 ($57) for other expenses.