Coalition Collapses in Sudan, Adding to Its Woes

This country’s ruling coalition broke up Saturday, adding political instability to the troubles of a nation battling economic collapse and a southern rebellion.

Prime Minister Sadek Mahdi’s Umma party and the Democratic Unionist Party said in a joint statement that the Democratic Unionist Party’s patron and spiritual leader, Mohammed Mirghani, was leaving the 15-month-old government.

It said “executive authorities” will remain in office during talks on forming a new coalition or a national unity government, state Omdurman Radio reported.

The statement did not make clear if ministers will remain in office until a new government is in place or if civil servants will run the administration, as in past crises.

The statement gave no reason for the decision by the Democratic Unionist Party to leave the coalition, but set Sept. 7 as a deadline for forming a new government.

The coalition partners had been at odds since an election two weeks ago when Umma took one of two Democratic Unionist Party seats on the five-member presidential Supreme Council.

Mahdi blamed the Democratic Unionist Party for the failure of its candidate, Ahmed Hamad, to win the seat. He argued that Hamad was unfit for office because he had been a close aide of President Jaafar Numeiri, ousted in a 1985 coup.

Umma and the DUP, Sudan’s oldest and most influential political parties, have 101 and 62 seats respectively in the 301-member Parliament.

Some politicians had earlier voiced fears that a breakup of the coalition could lead to a military coup.

The crisis overshadowed an agreement in principle that Sudan reached earlier this month with the International Monetary Fund on coping with an $11-billion foreign debt that Khartoum has been unable to service since the early 1980s.