Sudan

B

Political Divisions

Under a reorganization plan adopted in 1991, a federal system of nine states was set up, replacing the six previous administrative regions. The states are headed by a governor assisted by a Cabinet. The states are divided into 66 provinces and 218 districts. In 1994 the country was redivided into 26 states, with increased legislative and executive powers.

C

Principal Cities

The principal city and commercial centre is Khartoum, the capital. It has a population (2003 estimate) of 4,286,000, which forms a conurbation (grouped round the confluence of the Nile) with the pre-colonial capital of Omdurman (population, 2007 estimate, 2,810,000) and the industrial centre of Khartoum North 1983, 341,146). Other important towns are Port Sudan (1993, 305,385), the country’s main port on the Red Sea; Wâd Medanî (1993, 218,714), the centre of the Gezira; Al Ubayyiḑ (1993, 228,096), the main town of western Sudan; and Kassalā (1993, 234,270), the focus of eastern Sudan’s Beja peoples.

D

Religion

About 74 per cent of the people of Sudan are Muslims, about 17 per cent follow traditional religions, and most of the remainder are Christian. The people of northern Sudan are predominantly Sunni Muslims, practising a form of Islam that has been influenced by traditional, pre-Islamic religions; characteristics of Sudanese Islam include veneration of a great number of local “saints”, and, until the late 1980s, a great tolerance of other faiths. Most of the people in the south either practise traditional religions or are Christian.

These religious and cultural differences have been inextricably tied up in ancient tensions between the two regions, based in northern domination of the south, and have often come to symbolize them. Sudan’s civil war was fuelled by these divisions.

E

Language

There are 134 languages spoken in Sudan, mainly African languages from the Nilo-Saharan and Niger-Congo language families. The official language is Standard Arabic: although this is not a mother tongue, it is taught in schools though is not well known in the south. Sudanese Spoken Arabic is much more widely used (by at least 15 million mother-tongue speakers alone) and is unintelligible with Standard Arabic. Sudanese Creole Arabic is also spoken by some people, more often as a second language. Some of the important Nilo-Saharan languages are: Nuer (740,000), Fur (500,000), South-Western Dinka (450,000), North-Eastern Dinka (320,000), Nobin (295,000), and Central Kanuri (195,000). Widely spoken Niger-Congo languages include: Zande (350,000), Katcha-Kadugli-Miri (74,935), Koalib (44,258), Laro (40,000), and Tira (40,000). Around 418,000 speak Hausa, a Chadic language, while 915,000 speak Bedawi, a Cushitic language.

F

Education

Education is free but not compulsory in Sudan. In 2005 adult literacy was 63.2 per cent. In 1998–1999 about 2.48 million pupils attended state primary schools, and 1,010,060 students were enrolled in secondary schools. Many children in the north also attended Koranic schools. In addition, some 34,300 students attended vocational and teacher-training institutions. About 54,345 students attended institutions of higher education, which included the University of Khartoum (1956), Omdurman Islamic University (1912), the University of Juba (1975), and the University of Gezira (1975). The universities have frequently been closed by government because of political agitation among the students. The University of Juba has been closed by the civil war, and the school system in the south has also collapsed.