Ex-rebel governance body raided by security in El Fasher

A joint force of heavily armed Central Reserve Police and National Security officers yesterday morning raided the offices of the Transitional Darfur Regional Authority and the Darfur Reconstruction Fund in the Al Azma district of El Fasher. They arrested everybody in the headquarters and seized computers and a generator, as well as two cars belonging to the Authority.

The Transitional Darfur Regional Authority was formed in accordance with the 2006 Darfur Peace Agreement. Until earlier this year, it was headed by Minni Minawi.During the raid, the security closed streets that lead to the offices, leading to traffic jams within the city as working hours were beginning on Sunday. A witness told Radio Dabanga from El Fasher that the security forces began a hunt for members of the Minawi movement to arrest them. Yesterday Ahmed Yagub, director of the Office of Compensation, was reported among those arrested.

The raid coincides with growing hostility between the government and its erstwhile peace partner, SLM-Minawi. The SLM faction leader Minni Minawi is living in Juba in South Sudan. Pro-government newspapers last week alleged that his forces had begun moving southward from Darfur toward the South Sudan border, a move that the army considered hostile.

A source told Radio Dabanga that the security forces have occupied the headquarters of the Minawi movement in El Fasher and set up a security cordon around it. For his part, Abdelaziz Sam, a legal adviser in the movement, said the group blames the Governor Osman Mohamed Yusif Kibir, in large measure, for the arrest of any individual members of the movement. Speaking on Radio Dabanga, Abdelaziz Sam questioned why the movement’s offices or the Transitional Authority have been shut down in El Fasher, while they remain open in Khartoum.

Some of Minawi’s forces have taken up defensive positions around Zamzam Camp on the outskirts of El Fasher, a witness said.

Two days ago, the President of the Republic issued a decision appointing Gaafar Abdalhakim in charge of the Transitional Darfur Authority. The decision also made the commissions of the Transitional Authority dependent on the states governments of Darfur.