Officials say that the signing of a political deal to name a civilian government for Sudan has been pushed back to April 6.

An official has said that Sudanese leaders have put off signing an agreement to resume a short-lived democratic transition that was supposed to happen on Saturday. This is because there is still disagreement between military factions.

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Khalid Omar Yousif, a spokesman for the negotiation process, said on Twitter on Saturday that both military and civilian parties have agreed to "redouble efforts to overcome the last remaining obstacle in the next few days and clear the way for the final political agreement to be signed on April 6."

Yousif said earlier in the day that the signing of the agreement was put off because "there was no agreement on some open issues."

The process that started after General Omar al-Bashir was removed in 2019 was stopped by a coup led by the army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan in October 2021.

Representatives have been working on an agreement for weeks. This is the last step in a two-step political process that began in December to set the terms for bringing back the transition to civilian-led rule and democratic elections.

Reforming the security forces is a major point of contention in the talks. Once a civilian government is in place, generals are expected to leave politics.

Since the coup in 2021, there have been protests almost every week. In December, Burhan reached a deal with several groups that critics called "vague."

The powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which are led by Burhan's deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, would be brought into the regular army as part of the reforms.


The Popular Defense Forces, sometimes called "Janjaweed," were started by al-Bashir in 2003 to fight non-Arab rebels in the western part of Darfur. The RSF was formed in 2013. Since then, rights groups have said that the militia has done war crimes.


Experts have said that the rivalries between Burhan and Daglo are worrying, but the two men spoke together in the capital Khartoum last week to plead for integration to go well.

SOURCE: NEWS AGENCIES