The Pearls Cast Before Swine

By: Abdullah Ali Ibrahim

I listened to Commander Abdelaziz al-Hilu speaking to the youth of the resistance in the Abbasiya neighborhood on September 10th. It was evident from his recent meetings in Addis Ababa that his stance had shifted—while they initially demanded secularism, they had since compromised and would now accept a constitution based on the separation of religion and state. I am not sure whether the counter-revolution and the remnants of the old regime understand the distinction between the two concepts in principle. What is certain, however, is that they exploited his early insistence on secularism to the fullest, a move that—regrettably—came at a significant cost to the revolution. They seized upon the abandoned term within opposition circles as an opportunity to rebrand themselves as the defenders of Islam, despite their poor governance in its name. As the Western saying goes, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) has cast its pearls before swine.

The term “secularism” has long been absent from Sudanese constitutional discourse. It has not surfaced in leftist discussions since the dissolution of the Communist Party in 1965 and its subsequent struggle against the proposed Islamic constitution in 1968. Both the left and others have since opted for the term “civil state” to avoid the heavy connotations associated with secularism. In reality, secularism and a civil state are essentially the same. However, proponents of separating religion from the state suffer from onomatophobia—a fear of a particular word due to the harm its mere mention brings from past experiences. The SPLM’s revival of the concept of secularism was coupled with secession, much to the delight of the counter-revolutionary forces. They found their opponent walking straight into its demise. For decades, these forces controlled the narrative around secularism, branding it as a disgrace, while its original advocates abandoned it for more palatable alternatives like the “civil state” to appease the beast. Yet, appeasement was futile. I had hoped the SPLM would conduct a thorough study on how the counter-revolution leveraged their call for secularism as a means to undermine the revolution.

I was also surprised that the SPLM chose to explicitly advocate for secularism only after the revolution. The last official position they took on religion and the state with their allies was in the 2014 Paris Declaration, where they merely opened the issue for discussion. The declaration stated:

<span;>> “The two parties have thoroughly discussed the relationship between religion and the state as one of the fundamental issues and agreed to continue dialogue to reach a mutually acceptable formula.”

However, no further discussions on secularism took place, even after six long years. The SPLM took a gamble by demanding secularism after the revolution, despite previously compromising on it in the context of secession. They also failed to consider their allies in the central opposition, whose civil revolution already faced well-known obstacles. The counter-revolution was lying in wait, ready to seize upon any misstep regarding religion, just as they had used it to dissolve the Communist Party in 1965. We know that the Sudan Revolutionary Front has fractured, and even the SPLM itself has split. But this does not justify their decision to cast their pearls before swine—at a time that suits their opponents perfectly.

I do not understand why the SPLM believes that the separation of religion from the state can only be achieved by explicitly stating “secularism” in the constitution. France, for example, only explicitly declared itself a secular state in 1958, despite the fact that this was a demand of the French Revolution as early as 1789—so much so that they abolished Christianity and introduced an alternative religion. Meanwhile, the U.S. Constitution never once mentions secularism, nor does it even explicitly state the separation of religion and state. Instead, it simply declares:

<span;>> “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Nowhere in this First Amendment—one of the most famous constitutional texts—do we find an explicit reference to secularism or the separation of religion and state. So why does the SPLM insist on taking the hard road when the goal could be achieved in a much simpler way, especially given how politically and intellectually toxic the term “secularism” has become in Sudan?

Al-Hilu has now accepted the separation of religion from the state. However, the surprise awaiting him as he prepares for negotiations with the government is that this principle has already been agreed upon—at least in part—by the government and the Sudan Revolutionary Front in the preliminary peace talks in Juba. The Darfur Track Agreement explicitly called for the institutional separation of religion from the state to prevent the political exploitation of religion. Other agreements similarly affirmed the need for the state to maintain an equal distance from all religions and cultures, ensuring no ethnic, religious, or cultural bias that could undermine this right. In other words, what the SPLM was demanding from the Communist Party and Prime Minister Hamdok in Addis Ababa had already been agreed upon in Juba.

Perhaps it is fitting here to recall the wise words of Matthew Abor, one of the SPLM’s early members who later left the movement in the 1980s. He once told Colonel John Garang:

<span;>> “Garang, do not kill the sons of the South over the demand for secularism—a demand that even the northern elites have failed to impose on their own people.”