After a year of war, influential Sudanese tribes, including the Zureiqat tribe in Darfur and the Misseriya and Hawazma tribes in the Kordofan region, have aligned with the Sudanese army, indicating support for the military establishment and a weakening of the Rapid Support Forces. The head of the Revolutionary Awakening Council, Musa Hilal, has announced his full support for the army in its war against the Rapid Support Forces, stating that they are not with any militia.
Declining popularity of the troops
According to tribal sources, Hemedti sent a team of his army leaders and tribal leaders to Musa Hilal on February 15 in an attempt to resolve their differences. The two sides agreed that they would each promise not to hurt the other.
In addition, Hilal promised to keep his forces and compensate the Rapid Support Forces for the cars and cash they had taken from him when they stormed his home in the Mustariha area of North Darfur in 2017. The Rapid Support Forces had arrested Hilal, killed his son and nine of his supporters, and deported him to Khartoum, from where he was not released until March 2022.
The leader of the Mahamid clan was previously siding with the army, the head of the Shura Council of the Zaghawa tribe, and the Sultan of the Masalit tribe, as a UN report previously accused the Rapid Support Forces of killing 15,000 Masalit members in West Darfur state. Other tribal groups also adopted a similar position, attributing their position to their concern for the unity of Sudan’s land and people, sparing it the dangers of disintegration and collapse, and supporting the state and its national army as a national institution.
In the Kordofan region, the Misseriya tribe, whose members are considered the second component of the Rapid Support Forces after the Zureiqat, was divided. The Misseriya “Blues” sided with “Hemedti,” while the “Reds” sided with the Sudanese army, and their sons fought in the 22nd Division in the city of Babanusa in Western Province. Kordofan, and repelled waves of attacks to take control of the city.
Commenting on the shift in the position of several tribes, security expert Youssef Al-Sadiq believes that many tribes have revised their positions based on military developments, after the army achieved progress, the Rapid Support Forces retreated, and the violations they committed and heavy losses in their ranks, and they began to fear post-war repercussions and repercussions. .
Speaking to Al Jazeera Net, the security expert saw that the tribal and social incubator for rapid support was divided over it, and the positions of tribal leaders who were closer to “Hemedti” shifted, and others who were neutral, which will cast a shadow on the military situation and morale, which represents the strength and will to fight for any force in the country. the war.
Regarding Musa Hilal’s change of position, the expert says that this will achieve several gains for the army, and give it a vast area of land in which the “Awakening Council” forces can open, in a geographical location that represents the spatial and social incubator for rapid support without fighting, and gives the army land and a base for operations in the heart of Darfur and securing... Logistical and human support for him, which makes Hemedti's planning to control the rest of the region difficult.
Tribal influence
During the past months, the leaders of most of the tribes in northern, eastern and central Sudan announced their support for the army, along with large tribes in western Sudan, most notably the Hamar tribe in West Kordofan State, which formed a force of 5,000 fighters to protect their areas in coordination with the army.
Members of an influential sector of the Nuba tribe in South Kordofan state overtook the SPLM-N, led by Abdel Aziz al-Hilu, which controls some of the state’s localities, and fought alongside the army in confronting the Rapid Support Forces in the city of Dilling and protecting Kadugli, the state capital.
Political analyst and editor-in-chief of Al-Tayyar newspaper, Othman Mirghani, believes that when the war broke out, it had mostly political dimensions, and did not take on a tribal or regional dimension until its geographical scope expanded.
According to the analyst's statement to Al Jazeera Net, the direct and counter-tribal mobilization began with time, and the rapid support expanded into making tribal alliances, which helped provide him with a significant stock of nationalities whose leaders responded to Hemedti's call to stand by his side, with the hope that the reward would be political and economic influence.
He added that as the war entered its second year, it became clear that the tribal alignment behind the Rapid Support faced a reality different from what the leaders of those tribes had envisioned, as the analyst believes that the Rapid Support is declining on the ground and politically, and the final picture of the war is close to clarifying a future that Hemedti will not be the maker of. In addition to the accumulated bills left over from what happened in Darfur and the role his forces played in it.
He adds that the impact of this on the war is significant, as the tribes’ support for the army gives it national diversity, which refutes many of the slogans of support and incitement of hatred between the west and north of the country, as the army appears more nationalistic and representative of the Sudanese than ever before.
Reasons for conversion
The tribe's elites and intellectuals formed the new organization known as the "Zariqat Tribe Coordination" during the previous period. They feel that Hemedti's ambitions and outside forces forced him to carry out a project whose outcome is unknown, that the tribe is paying a heavy price and that its people are being subjected to what amounts to extermination, and that the tribe's image has been distorted as a result. Because the majority of the forces and their leadership are members of the tribe, the Sudanese people hold them accountable for the crimes and violations carried out by the Rapid Support Forces.
Ibrahim Arabi, a researcher on the affairs of the tribes in western Sudan, thinks that although the tribes aligned themselves with the army, they had their disagreements, too, and were hurt by the army's quick support, leading them to believe that the war had moved beyond internal conflicts to become an invasion from without. Additionally, some of these tribes are at odds with Hemedti and disapprove of his plans and employment of militias. Arabic against ethnic African-American groups, as he described them.
The same researcher told Al Jazeera Net that Musa Hilal is trying to save his tribe and the Arab component of the Rapid Support "Al-Atawa" in order to gather their diaspora and prevent them from going extinct. However, there are concerns among the components that they won't want to go through what Hemedti did. The spokesperson thought Hilal's attempts to work out a deal with the government were likely to be successful, before the warriors from Rapid Support were "dispersed" and made into isolated islands.
