Sudan (MNN) — The United States recently praised Sudan’s transitional government for its financial transparency. Officials published their spending budgets within three months of enactment. Sudan’s inflation rate soared past 400-percent last month; a 33-percent increase from May.
“They (Sudan’s transitional government) are trying to get out from under debt and incredible inflation, and COVID, and all of those things, so that they can get some international involvement,” says John*, a Gospel worker partnering with unfoldingWord in Sudan.
“They’re trying to put a new face on Sudan.”
Old habits die hard, though. Take persecution, for example.
Earlier this month, gunmen attacked a Christian government worker and threatened to kill him. “If I understand it correctly, he was part of a committee set up to return property that was illegally seized under the previous Bashir government,” John says.
April 2019 protestors in Khartoum, Sudan.
(Photo credit: Hind Mekki/Flickr/CC2.0)
“It wasn’t just that he was an independent person advocating for it. He was part of the group trying to facilitate that happening.”
The struggle for Sudan
Sudan’s transition from dictatorship to civilian rule is complicated, to say the least. To understand Sudan’s challenges, one must recognize the country’s history and context.
See our full Sudan coverage here.
“Sudan has been through a number of transitions. One of them, the recent one, is from a minority, Arab-Islamic government and primarily black African country, to a combination of civil government and military government forming a (leadership) committee,” John explains.
“90% of the people on the government that were there before are still there, so the roots of the conflict between Islam and Christianity, and Arabs and ethnic blacks, continues.”
Pray God will move mightily in Sudan. “The movement of God among Muslims who are coming to Christ, and leading at a grassroots level, is significant in several places,” John says.
Pray that God’s Holy Spirit continues moving among unreached people groups despite ongoing persecution. In one community we won’t name for security purposes, five people “have come to know Christ [and] they began leading small studies,” John says.
“All five of them had their houses burnt down in the last 60 days.”
*Name withheld for security purposes.
Header image depicts Sudanese forces. (Photo courtesy of smahel/Pixabay)
