The Dam Building in Northern Sudan: Is it a Tool for the Resettlement of Millions of Egyptian Peasants? Is it a New Darfur Scenario in the Making?

(Mohammed Jalal Hashim gave this lecture in London in 2008 to a Solicitors International Human Rights Group.)

Abstract

Background: I will try to discuss the deteriorating situation in northern Sudan that has resulted from the policies of demographic engineering implemented by the government. The components of this policy are as follows: (a) building a series of dams in northern Sudan so as to evacuate the region and resettle the Nubians and Manasir and Amri-Hamdab people (i.e. the indigenous ethnic groups who are affected by the construction of the dams) far away from tl1eir home villages; (b) bringing in millions of Egyptian peasants to settle in tl1e areas evacuated by the indigenous groups. The plan is being implemented in collaboration with the Egyptian government, it was the Egyptian government who first engendered this plan in its own Nubian region. It seems that this is not the first time the khartoum government adopted such a policy it was implemented in Darfur, leading to the crisis there. In the case of Darfur, a whole Arab nomadic tribe from Chad was welcomed into the region. It was armed and supported by the Sudanese government to evenmally wreak havoc in Darfur (cf. Hashim, 2008).