{"id":52825,"date":"2025-08-13T21:09:03","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T18:09:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/?p=52825"},"modified":"2025-08-13T21:09:03","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T18:09:03","slug":"shafshafa-destructive-dismantling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/13\/shafshafa-destructive-dismantling\/","title":{"rendered":"Shafshafa: Destructive Dismantling"},"content":{"rendered":"

Abdullah Ali Ibrahim<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dr. al-Buni recently published a thought-provoking article arguing that analyses of our current war have tended to focus on \u201ctribe\u201d at the expense of \u201cclass.\u201d I commented, noting that the absence of class-based analysis is not due to its inapplicability, but rather to the fact that Marxists\u2014who originally introduced this framework into our discourse\u2014have long since abandoned it. Given the importance of al-Buni\u2019s point (war analysis being, after all, a central intellectual endeavor), I am republishing an earlier piece of mine that approached the phenomenon of \u201cShafshafa\u201d through a class lens.<\/p>\n

Summary
\nShafshafa is a practice in this war that warrants closer study in light of Sudan\u2019s \u201cInqaz\u201d regime\u2014not only the country\u2019s longest-serving government since independence in 1956, but one that embedded state, political, and cultural structures likely to endure for years to come.<\/p>\n

In various circulated videos, members of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are seen confronting groups of civilians\u2014labeled \u201cmutafalliteen\u201d (lawless elements)\u2014caught looting markets and neighborhoods. While RSF members themselves have not been immune from theft, the remarks of some of these soldiers in the videos ring with genuine indignation, even religious moralism, at the scenes of plunder unfolding before them. This is despite the RSF leadership\u2019s use of such footage to present itself as combating what it calls \u201cnegative phenomena,\u201d a term used to distance the force from the crimes of these \u201cmutafalliteen.\u201d The RSF even created a department dedicated to \u201ccombating negative phenomena.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looting and the \u201cNegative Citizen\u201d
\nOne video from Wad Madani\u2014occupied by the RSF\u2014shows an RSF recruit scolding impoverished women and children for breaking into and looting market stalls. Filming them and their stolen goods, he remarks that these are ordinary citizens who seized the opportunity to loot, not RSF personnel. His words suggest a broader social picture of the war\u2014one that includes citizens themselves as active \u201cnegative phenomena,\u201d quick to take what is not theirs when the chance arises.<\/p>\n

This is not new in Islamic historical literature, which records similar urban underclasses: the ayy\u0101r\u016bn in Baghdad after the civil strife between al-Amin and al-Ma\u2019mun (809 AD); the z\u02bf\u0101r in Egypt following the death of Sultan Barquq (1399), who emerged amid rural revolts and turned to banditry. Modern economists might compare them to the \u201csurplus population\u201d of early capitalist cities\u2014what Marx called the lumpenproletariat, viewing them as reactionary tools rather than revolutionary agents.<\/p>\n

In Sudan today, such \u201cnegative citizens\u201d often trace their roots to displaced populations from the country\u2019s civil wars\u2014in South Sudan, the Nuba Mountains, and Darfur\u2014who settled in urban peripheries known as the \u201cBlack Belt.\u201d The Inqaz regime, ruling in the name of \u201cthe state\u2019s repentance to God,\u201d abandoned many state responsibilities, marginalizing these communities and leaving them to survive in the informal economy, while concentrating wealth and opportunities among the ruling elite.<\/p>\n

From Corruption to Kleptocracy
\nCorruption under Inqaz went far beyond the conventional definition. It became structural\u2014a mode of production in itself\u2014transforming the state into a kleptocracy. Political power was systematically converted into personal wealth, through government-owned companies, off-budget revenues (tajneeb), and elaborate patronage networks. By the mid-2010s, hundreds of state-affiliated companies operated beyond the reach of the Finance Ministry, enriching ministers and their families through circular schemes of public asset stripping.<\/p>\n

The Meaning of Shafshafa
\nSudanese today use the term \u201cshafshafa\u201d to describe opportunistic looting in times of chaos. It is akin to \u201cshala\u02bf\u201d (to tear out completely), as in a recent video showing citizens stripping the roof off a house for resale. Folk wisdom phrases it as: \u201cIf your father\u2019s house is ruined, take a piece from it.\u201d<\/p>\n

This destructive opportunism echoes the state-led \u201cdismantling\u201d (tafk\u012bk) initiated after the 2018 revolution to dismantle the Inqaz regime under the 2019 Dismantling Law. But that effort faltered\u2014undermined by both counter-revolutionary forces and the transitional government\u2019s own mismanagement\u2014until the October 2021 coup halted the process entirely, annulled the committee\u2019s work, and paved the way for today\u2019s collapse. In the ensuing war, the \u201cnegative citizen\u201d has taken to shafshafa\u2014claiming a piece from the wreckage of the state.<\/p>\n

Shafshafa, then, is not just random looting. It is the grassroots mirror of a long-standing elite practice\u2014an aftershock of kleptocracy\u2014tearing the country apart \u201cbolt by bolt,\u201d to borrow the famous phrase of Wajdi Saleh from the dissolved dismantling committee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Abdullah Ali Ibrahim Dr. al-Buni recently published a thought-provoking article arguing that analyses of our current war have tended to focus on \u201ctribe\u201d at the expense of \u201cclass.\u201d I commented, noting that the absence of class-based analysis is not due to its inapplicability, but rather to the fact that Marxists\u2014who originally introduced this framework into …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13023,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52825","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52825"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52825\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52826,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52825\/revisions\/52826"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sudanevents.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}