Step to the Left

Located astride the headwaters of the Nile River, the Sudan is rich in history but little else. It was the home of the dervishes who defeated and put to death Britain's General Charles ("Chinese") Gordon in 1885, and who were in turn defeated by a punitive expedition under General Herbert Kitchener. Until 1956, the Sudan was nominally ruled by Britain and Egypt. Then it asserted independence and took possession of the largest land area of any African nation. Independence brought a bitter civil conflict, now 13 years old, between the 10 million Arabs of the north and the 4 million blacks of the south, who have been fighting for autonomy.

Since 1964, the Sudan's regime has been dangerously weak but relatively democratic--unlike the militant dictatorships so common in the Arab World. Last week, at the beginning of the season of blazing desert heat, the Sudan's moderate but often corrupt civilian leaders were overthrown in a coup that was brought off with the suddenness of a Khartoum haboob. In the early morning, telephone and cable lines were cut, troop carriers rolled across the White Nile bridge and along Palace Avenue. Tanks took up positions at the front gates of the Republican Palace, built on the site and in the mold of the palace where General Gordon was slain. By morning, a new government was installed, one that conforms more closely to the modern Arab pattern of army-backed leftist regimes, and dedicated to the struggle against Israel.

"We are socialists but not extremists or fanatics," announced new Prime Minister Babikir Awadallah, a London-trained barrister and onetime Chief Justice of the Sudan. But, he added in an introductory meeting with Khartoum's diplomatic corps, "we are Arabs and fanatics as far as the Palestine question is concerned. We advocate nonalignment in foreign policy, but we will stand fast against any country that supports Israel, be it Eastern or Western."

Easy Path to Power. Awadallah's militant pronouncements correspond to the cast of the new regime. The Cabinet is primarily civilian, drawn from the extreme leftist, Pan-Arab intelligentsia; eight of its 24 members belong to the Sudan's Communist Party, the most entrenched in the Arab world. The Cabinet in turn is responsible to a Revolutionary Council of a "Free Officers Front," headed by the man who engineered the coup: Major General (he promoted himself from colonel overnight) Gaafar Mohamed Nimeri, 40, a dour single-minded soldier who received training at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kans. Nimeri had earned his reputation as a daring soldier fighting the black guerrillas to the south. When other senior officers sent junior men on patrol, Nimeri personally led his men in jungle forays.

Their path to power was made easier by the previous regime, which had virtually courted a coup by its internal bickering and corruption. Members of Parliament openly sold firearms permits in the streets. Last year a partnership was uncovered between an Indian textile merchant and President Ismail Azhari's twelve-year-old son. For weeks before it was overthrown, the ruling coalition had been in effect a caretaker government, after the powerful Umma Party had healed a split between its traditionalist and progressive wings. The man in line to become Prime Minister had been Sadik Mahdi, 33, a progressive, development-minded politician who had made a promising start on solving the Sudan's problems during a brief stint as Prime Minister in 1966-67. Just after the take-over last week, Sadik gathered with his followers in the anteroom of the holy tomb of the Mahdi in Omdurman. Dressed in a white silk galabia, he spoke in a whisper, but he professed not to be discouraged by the army takeover and hinted that there might be further upheaval. "Any coup is born with a countercoup," he told TIME Correspondent William Smith, adding, "We believe our task in the ultimate reform of the Sudan is not made more difficult by what has happened."

Unpromising Beginning. The first acts of the new regime, however, indicated that the ultimate reform of the Sudan is probably farther off than ever. The government promptly recognized East Germany on the basis of East Berlin's opposition to Israel, and announced its intention of sending a mission to Moscow to seek arms. At home, the new rulers hinted at nationalizing "local capital with imperialist connections," which could only sound ominous to the owners of Sudan's British Petroleum, Shell and Mobil oil interests. The military character of the regime, moreover, probably also means a stepped-up campaign against the blacks in the south. Even in the capital, the coup may not long remain bloodless. The new government announced that it will try the deposed civilian politicians--including Sadik Mahdi--for high treason.

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