Sudan these days is setting foot on a difficult but necessary road: to move out of the circle of urgent relief into the horizon of recovery and building. While the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, Denise Brown, said that funding for the humanitarian response reached 1.9 billion dollars in 2025 and 1.2 billion dollars so far this year, she warned that this support remains temporary and its effect stops as soon as the funding stops. The message is clear: no future can remain hostage to relief funds; rather, it needs investment in production and the livelihood sectors that put people on their feet.
This position does not mean denying the humanitarian need now. Affected communities cannot bear delays in medicine or food. But the catastrophe deepens when the emergency turns into a permanent system, and when some think that the flow of aid is enough to restore a shattered economy. Aid provides a breathing space, but it does not build a factory, does not restore a local market, and does not provide a job for a young man looking for an income to spare him need. That is why the United Nations' focus on the "Private Sector Recovery Dialogue" organized by the Ministry of Finance in cooperation with the United Nations Development Programme in Khartoum comes as a step in the right direction. The private sector is the home of initiative, the field of work, and the place where funding is turned into goods and services that circulate in the markets and return as public benefit.
From the perspective of SUDAN TRUTH newspaper, there is no option before the country but to hold on to the unity of Sudan, north and south, and to work with the state's institutions as a unifying framework to support stability. Supporting institutions does not mean defending specific persons; rather, it means protecting the framework of the state and its ability to manage public money, organize the market and open investment. In return, we stand against all discourses of division and sectarianism, and against the Islamists and Arabists who reduce the country to slogans and ruin our diversity, which is our true wealth. We are also against Qaht, those policies that trade in slogans, harmed the institutions and ignited absurd divisions. Unity — in its national meaning, not in the meaning of ethnic or partisan alignment — is the way to expand the investment base, attract capital, and create production chains that cross the states instead of being isolated within them.
Practically, what does this mean? It means four direct priorities. First: converting part of the humanitarian funding into guarantees and productive investments in agriculture, manufacturing industries and small-scale energy, in a way that creates goods sold locally and exported if possible. Second: protecting the market from speculation and moving cash through real local purchases, not through intermediary channels that consume the money without effect on the ground. Third: empowering small producers and cooperatives in Darfur, the East, the Nuba Mountains, Khartoum and all the regions, so that recovery does not remain the preserve of the capitals. Fourth: separating economic discourse from any political fighting: no bias toward a party in the war, no hate speech, and no undocumented claims; only policies that can be measured and followed up.
From here, we call on the government, the international community and the private sector to a practical, fast-acting agreement: a roadmap for investment in 90 days, with a clear bank of projects, incentives for local content, and transparent oversight mechanisms. The goal is not a conference report, but a jobs indicator, a factory counter, and export figures. If this transition does not happen, Sudan will keep asking, and will not begin giving.
The call for investment is not slogans in the air. It is a matter of destiny. The Sudanese do not wait for a hand to be extended to them forever; they wait for a job opportunity, a machine running, and a market returning. This will only be achieved when the state's priority returns to its institutions, when Sudanese diversity is the support of the economy rather than its divider, and when the approaches of demolition and alignment are defeated before the project of building. Let us begin now, with clear economic steps, measured by numbers, not by headlines.
— Al-Tayeb Hamad
