Monitoring Desk
KHARTOUM: The Sudanese army was Thursday planning to make “an important announcement”, state media said amid speculations that country’s longtime leader President Omar al-Bashir has resigned after months of protests against him.
Thousands of Khartoum residents chanted “the regime has fallen” as they flooded the area around army headquarters where protesters have held an unprecedented sit-in now in its sixth day.
“The Sudanese army will issue an important statement soon. Wait for it,” the state television anchor said, without giving further details.
The protests, which erupted in December, have become the biggest challenge yet to Bashir´s three decades of iron-fisted rule.
“We are waiting for big news,” one protester told AFP from the sit-in.
“We won´t leave from here until we know what it is. But we do know that Bashir has to go.
“We had enough of this regime — 30 years of repression, corruption, rights abuses, it´s enough.”
Crowds of demonstrators have spent five nights defiantly camped outside the sprawling headquarters complex, which also houses Bashir´s official residence and the defence ministry.
There has been an often festive mood at the sit-in with protesters singing dancing to the tunes of revolutionary songs.
Several military vehicles carrying troops entered the compound in the early hours of Thursday, witnesses said.
And witnesses said many army vehicles carrying troops were deploying in the centre of Khartoum early Thursday.
The group spearheading the nationwide demonstrations urged residents of the capital to mass outside army headquarters.
“We call on our people from across the Khartoum capital and the region around to immediately go to the sit-in area and not leave from there until our next statement is issued,” the Sudanese Professionals Association said.
Courtesy: (AFP)
