Sudan’s top general has confirmed that the ruling military council will be dissolved as a power-sharing deal has been reached with protesters, reported Yahoo News. The Transitional Military Council assumed power after the overthrow of President Omar al-Bashir in April.
The military and the protest and opposition leaders agreed to a power-sharing deal last week. The agreement was announced days after the protesters held mass marches through Khartoum and other areas.
As part of the deal, a joint sovereign council will rule for a little over three years while elections are organized. A military leader will head the council for the first 21 months, followed by a civilian leader for the next 18. The two sides also agreed on an independent Sudanese investigation into security forces’ deadly crackdown on the protests last month.
According to the activists and officials, diplomatic pressure by the United States and its Arab allies on both the sides to accept proposals from the African Union and Ethiopia was a key to ending a weeks-long standoff that raised fears of all-out civil war.
In a televised address on late Sunday, Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, the head of the military council, said the army would return to its barracks after 21 months, when leadership of the council passes from a military representative to a civilian. He said the military council will dissolve after the civilian leader takes over.
Burhan said the military is discussing the candidates for the sovereign council with the Force for Declaration of Freedom and Change, which represents the protest movement.
Meanwhile, Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the deputy head of Sudan’s Transitional Military Council, has announced that he “does not want to be president.” He also clarified that reports of a rift with the country’s umbrella opposition movement group are false.
