Sudan's army-aligned government says fuel ships are unloading and outage hours will be cut gradually, as ministers look to the World Bank to fund repairs and the central bank tries to bring more gold revenue through official channels.
Sudan's Minister of Energy and Petroleum in the army-aligned government, Al-Moatasem Ibrahim Ahmed, said his ministry was in a state of emergency after a week of drone strikes on electricity facilities, Sudan Tribune reported on 2 November, citing his interview with Al Araby Television. He said an emergency plan to rehabilitate damaged stations was under way and that power-cut hours would be reduced gradually until maintenance was complete, while warning that repairs were costly and slow.
The minister said several fuel ships had arrived and begun unloading for distribution to filling stations, and that he expected the fuel crisis to ease within days. The Khartoum-based outlet Al-Hayat Al-Youm carried the same remarks.
Funding and the farming season
The Minister of State for Finance, Mohamed Noor Abdel-Daim, met representatives of the World Bank and the Trade and Development Bank (TDB), which implements the Ascent project, to discuss urgent funding for public power stations knocked out by the attacks, according to Sudan Tribune. Officials also discussed how to limit the effect of blackouts on the winter agricultural season, including alternative energy supplies for irrigation schemes. No funding commitment was announced.
The outages have already spread to daily life. Dozens of bakeries in Khartoum closed last week, citing shortages of flour, diesel and power, and Sudan Tribune said nearly 18 distribution stations in ten states had suffered severe damage.
Gold exports under review
Separately, the governor of the Central Bank of Sudan, Amna Mirghani Hassan El-Tom, chaired a meeting on 2 November with the Minister of Minerals, Nour El-Daim Taha, the Gold Export Window, the standards authority, exporters and security and regulatory agencies, Sudan Tribune reported. According to the bank's statement, participants discussed a "flexible and fair" pricing mechanism based on global rates, transfer limits and restrictions on export proceeds, and diversifying export markets.
Not everyone was in the room. Moatasem Mohamed Saleh, secretary-general of the Gold Exporters Division, told Sudan Tribune that his body had been excluded and learned of the outcome through the media.
Gold is Sudan's main source of foreign currency. The sector has long been shaped by smuggling, competing buyers and official prices below those in foreign markets, and control of gold-producing areas and trade routes is itself a driver of the war. Both the army and the RSF have been accused of using gold revenues to finance their operations.
Image: Port Sudan, looking east from the town centre towards the harbour cranes, 2008. Bertramz, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0.