The Ansar Affairs Association, the body of followers of Imam El Sadig El Mahdi, is mobilising its supporters in Sudan for peaceful protests against the detention of their imam and leader of the National Umma Party (NUP).

El Mahdi was detained on Saturday evening by the Sudanese National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) and taken to Khartoum North’s Kober prison.

The security service accused the NUP leader of “disrespecting the prestige of the state,” discrediting the regular armed forces, spreading false news, causing unrest among Sudanese troops, and breaching the public peace.

El Mahdi had strongly denounced the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a group of militia commanded by the NISS, accusing them of committing war crimes in Darfur, recruiting non-Sudanese, and operating beyond the scope of the regular armed forces.

In an interview with Radio Dabanga on Wednesday, Abdel Mahmoud Abo, the secretary-general of the Ansar Affairs Association, described the detention of the NUP leader as “purely political,” contending that the government aims to detain him as long as possible without due process.

The secretary-general stressed that “the association has sent messages to the ansar and democracy-loving people in all parts of Sudan to prepare for supporting and protecting the imam by all lawful means.”

“We intend to use all our constitutional rights by pressuring the regime to release Imam Sadig El Mahdi, and abolish the freedom-restricting laws of the country. We will continuously be organising demonstrations, sit-ins and other acts of civil disobedience to peacefully achieve a democratic transformation in Sudan.”

Sudan’s government has begun to move more irregular troops into the area of the national capital, stationing three brigades of RSF around the city, commanded by a Darfur militia leader Brig. Mohamed Hamdan ‘Hemeti’.

File photo: Imam El Sadig El Mahdi among followers in Omdurman (Namaa Faisal)