To many, Burhan's initiative is a reflection of the political success of the mass demonstrations on 30 June condemning both last year's putsch by Gen Burhan and the coup led by General Omer Hassan Ahmed el Beshir and the National Islamic Front in 1989 which ended a three-year interregnum of constitutional government under El Sadig el Mahdi...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     President Omer Hassan Ahmed el Beshir had hoped that the planned return of veteran politician El Sadig el Mahdi  after two years of exile in Egypt  would give a veneer of credibility to the political talks...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     It takes a lot to unite Sudan's oppositionists but the chorus of condemnation was deafening including El Sadig el Mahdi...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	    • April 1986: El Turabi fails to win parliamentary seat in free elections; at insistence of DUP leader Mohamed Osman el Mirghani  joins his brother-in-law El Sadig el Mahdi's government as Attorney General  later Foreign Minister (AC Vol 27 No 9  The shadow of the Brotherhood)...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
            Vol 57 No 3 | 
            - SOUTH SUDAN
	      Salva Kiir increasingly relies on a few close supporters from his own Greater Bahr el Ghazal region  especially members of the Jieng Council of Elders  a self-appointed group of Dinka grandees and elder statesmen  led by ex-Chief Justice Ambrose Riiny Thiik and a Sudanese ex-Deputy Premier under El Sadig el Mahdi  Aldo Ajou Deng Akuei (AC Vol 46 No 10  Running the South & Vol 43 No 5  'Making politics and war together')...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     Now  France helps the opposition  hosting the August 2014 Paris Declaration by the Sudan Revolutionary Front (SRF) and El Sadig el Mahdi's Umma Party faction...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     Before its National Dialogue gathering in Khartoum  the NCP regime tried to tempt the National Umma Party leader  El Sadig el Sideeg el Mahdi  on board  as in the past...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     El Tigani was South Darfur Governor when the Arab Alliance (Tijamu el Arabi) first began marauding in the late 1980s  under El Sadig el Sideeg el Mahdi's elected government...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     They included United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon  the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement-North  Britain  Amnesty International and the National Umma Party (though not El Sadig el Sideeg el Mahdi  who called for restorative rather than retributive justice)...
	 
    
    
    
    
        
	
	     The Umma Party will also boycott  its leader El Sadig el Mahdi assured Africa Confidential last October (AC Vol 55 No 25  The opposition shows a new political will)...