Headlines:

• Sudan Army Tries to Maintain the Status Quo
• Ukraine Turns to Comedy Actor
• Egypt Constitutional Referendum Approved, Cementing Sisi’s Power to 2030

Sudan Army Tries to Maintain the Status Quo

The army in Sudan has received its blessing from the US. The deputy chairman of the Transitional Military Council, Lieutenant General Mohammad Hamdan Daglo met the US Charge d’Affaires of the US Embassy in Khartoum, Stephen Kotsis Doglo on 14 April and briefed the American diplomat. The military has been working since it removed Omar Bashir from office to maintain the status quo and the army’s privileged position in the country. The army received its blessing from the US and has since seen Saudi Arabia and the UAE send $3 billion in financial aid. The head of Sudan’s transitional military council will be sending a delegation to the US to discuss removing Sudan from the US list of state sponsors of terrorism. Sudan has been facing protests since December 2018 over the country’s economic crisis. This evolved into a mass uprising with people demanding change and calling for the army to step down from power. The transitional council has attempted to appease the public by setting up a transitional process with the army remaining in control. But the public are seeing through this. Sudan’s National Umma Party (NUP) has declared that it would assume no role in the country’s interim government and instead called on the transitional military council to relinquish control to a civilian authority.

Ukraine Turns to Comedy Actor

Volodymyr Zelenskiy is now not just the president of Ukraine in his comedy television series Servant of the People, but he is now the real president of the nation of Ukraine after earning 74% of the presidential election vote against the incumbent, Petro Poroshenko. After all the promises of the Maidan protests that eventually led to Poroshenko’s ascension, Ukraine never really changed. Poroshenko himself is a member of the oligarchic class that has long dominated Ukraine, and though his administration was a material threat to many of his contemporaries, it was never a threat to the system itself. Zelenskiy’s landslide victory is in line with global trends where public frustration over the elites has boiled over into them turning to unconventional politicians and political parties. The 2014 Euromaidan Revolution raised expectations, providing a glimpse of the perceived change that many thought possible in the country. But reform efforts under Poroshenko produced mixed results. Reforms in the energy sector, for instance, led to higher utility costs, while wages have not kept up with inflation. Meanwhile, efforts to tackle corruption through judicial and legal reforms failed.  Zelenskiy — who had no previous political experience and offered no clear policy prescriptions during his campaign — thus served as a protest candidate.

Egypt Constitutional Referendum Approved, Cementing Sisi’s Power to 2030

Egypt approved a constitutional referendum that allows President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to stay in power until 2030. The body added on Tuesday 23rd nearly 90% of the votes cast were in favour of the new constitutional reforms. The nationwide turnout was only 44%, the commission said.

“These (changes) are effective from now as your constitution,” commission chairman Lasheen Ibrahim told a news conference broadcast on state TV, adding that more than 23.4 million voters had endorsed the changes in the referendum. The amendments include articles that would give Sisi two more years to his current term, extending his term to 2024. He will also be able to run for an additional six-year term, according to Article 241 in the amendments. Other articles include provisions that would allow Sisi to appoint one or more vice presidents, senior judges, the attorney general and the head of the supreme constitutional court.