Minni Minawi does not look like a warlord. The former primary school teacher is a softly spoken Sudanese, in a grey pinstripe suit. Yet 34-year-old Minawi is the military leader of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), one of two rebel factions locked in battle with the Sudanese government in Darfur.
”This [Darfur] is worse than Rwanda. This is not only killing, but starving, displacing, disease and poverty. The militias are targeting our water sources,” says Minawi, whose father is in a refugee camp on the Chad border. The youngest of 10 children, Minawi has not seen his family since the conflict began. ”After I became involved, the police arrested my father and brother and tortured them. They were civilians; they knew nothing. So it is better for me not to see my family.”
In spite of the stakes involved, Minawi’s aims sound as moderate as his suit. ”I am 100% Sudanese. To fight for the independence of Darfur is not logical,” he says. ”We want an end to setting civilian areas on fire and the discrimination by the central government. We want a fairer distribution of oil revenue.”
According to oil analysts, Sudan produces a light crude, which is the most sought-after type of oil. Because the industry is operating without much spare capacity, even a small disruption in production is enough to spook the market and drive oil prices higher.
Minawi continues, speaking of tribal differences: ”We do not hate the Arab tribes; some of them are even fighting alongside us,” he says. ”But we have a discrimination problem in Sudan like the South Africans had under apartheid. But for us, it is more. We have moved into ethnic cleansing and genocide.”
The SLA was formed in May 2001, when Minawi and two of his friends sent a letter to the government protesting human rights abuses in Darfur. When the government tried to arrest the signatories, they resisted. ”At our first fight, in August 2001, we had 18 fighters and 10 guns against the police,” recalls Minawi. ”Now we have about 30 000 men.” Their arms come from Chad and from captured government soldiers. Minawi claims the SLA have captured tanks and anti-aircraft guns that they have mounted on bakkies.
The fight has not been easy. One of Minawi’s childhood friends, Abdullah Bakir, was wounded by a helicopter gunship while leading an attack last January. ”I got to him before he died. He was a good person, a brave man,” says Minawi. Bakir’s first child was born two months later.
Minawi seems confident that the situation in Darfur will be classified as genocide and the international community will intervene.
Although there are currently 350 African Union ”ceasefire monitors” in the region, their mandate is limited. Last Sunday Khartoum agreed to allow up to 4 000 African monitors. When asked what the SLA will do if no assistance arrives, Minawi retreats into vagueness, saying he ”will not talk about things that haven’t happened yet”.
London-based analyst Alex Vines believes that one possibility is an alliance with John Garang’s Sudanese People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) in the south. ”It would require a degree of pragmatism, because there are differences over leadership and tactics,” he said. Minawi denies that his SLA has formal links with the SPLA but a joint offensive would stretch the government and strengthen the bargaining power of both groups.
The rainy season is drawing to an end, giving the rebels greater mobility. ”Some people who fought in the south fight with us, and some of our people fought in the south,” Minawi acknowledges. ”We are all in the National Democratic Alliance [an umbrella for political opposition].”