The War Breaks Out

On 1st April 2023 the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF), the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and some civilian platforms were expected to sign an agreement to guide the transition of Sudan towards a democratic civilian government and the integration of both armies into a unified national one. Unfortunately that event never took place and the war between SAF and RSF broke out on 15th April 2023.

While other conflicts in the country had taken place in the peripheries, this one exploded in the capital, Khartoum, where most universities were located. The conflict expanded and affected 135 out of the 157 Sudanese universities. These government and private colleges and universities hosted around 87% of the students of the country. Some of them left their home as the RSF soldiers entered their houses, pointed them with a Kalashnikov and obliged them to move with the minimum necessary and an uncertain future.

More than 11 million persons had to leave their homes as a consequence of this conflict and resettle in other cities of the country or abroad as refugees. In this latter case, students who wished to continue their university journey could not do it as the hosting universities require transcript details certificates authenticated by the Ministry of Higher Education and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Sudan. All these procedures were impossible in a country at war. Thousands of them had reached Egypt or South Sudan where it was almost impossible to find a job. Thus, which future for this young people who had started a university career and could not continue it neither were able to find a job? The landscape was not much favourable for those who had remained in Sudan, scattered through villages, or in towns where economic activities were in standby or occupied by the original inhabitants.

Another segment of population particularly affected by the war are persons with chronic and terminal diseases. Most of the local companies of medicines were established in the city of Wad Medani that was invaded by the RSF on 15th December 2023. This invasion blocked the local production of medicines. Moreover the arrival of thousands of wounded and displaced persons in the areas under SAF control led to the collapse of the health systems of the hosting areas. Priority was for injured persons.

Education and Health on the Move

In November 2023 I managed to reach the city of Port Sudan, located in the Northeast of the country and controlled by the SAF. There the Comboni Missionaries run a Secondary School that had some vacant rooms. Thus our University College, the Comboni College of Science and Technology (CCST), previously located in the centre of Khartoum, could find a place to open an office in which our Learning Management System manager and I, the Principal, re-organized the College to resume activities online even if our students and lecturers were all scattered.

Most of the members of our nursing department had taken refuge 200 km south of Khartoum, in the city of Wad Medani, along with some students and lecturers. With the funding of a project we planned to establish also some offices there to provide them access to the internet and to combine the online activities with the organization of clinical practice for the students of the Bachelor Degree in Nursing Sciences.

The invasion of the RSF on 15th December 2023 obliged them to leave their refuge and set on the move again. This time the nursing team of the College headed Port Sudan, where they reached at the beginning of January 2024 after completing the 1,100 km that separate both locations.

After sharing our plans with the State Ministry of Health we organized the clinical practice of our nursing students and registered the first nursing clinic of the country. This clinic is a very unique one as it is a Palliative Care Hospice. In the clinic, our nursing department works with a network of volunteers. Two hundred volunteers have been trained along 2024 in different locations of the outskirts of Port Sudan. They are Muslims and Christians moved by a common driver. Muslims start their prayer in the name of God the most merciful. Jesus revealed to us the merciful face of God. And mercy is the driver that moves these volunteers to go outside themselves to support families who accompany persons with terminal and chronic diseases.

The first group of 30 students of the Bachelor Degree in Nursing Sciences arrived to Port Sudan in May 2024. Some of them had to pass through areas under the control of the RSF to arrive to this SAF controlled region after dozens of military checkpoints. We even had two students who were in Zalingei (West Darfour), fled away 1,058 km southwards until Aweil in South Sudan, then travelled eastwards 787 km until Juba and from there took the plane to Port Sudan. They were ready to fight for their own future.

In Port Sudan the nursing students had their clinical practice and health centers and supported the group of the volunteers. In this way the College integrated its academic activities with community service and transformation of this community through the attention to the weakest.

 

 

Recovering Hope and Transforming the Community

After the first group of nursing students, a second one arrived. This time they were 74. And their number continued growing. Some of them explicitly said that they had lost hope. When they saw the first group resuming studies they believed that it was possible.

The action of the clinic in the community has also attracted some local NGOs who started supporting its work with donations of medicines and food. While hatred speech spreads among the partisans of both armies, our volunteers transform their communities through mercy and the students of our different programs build their future.

 

Fr. Jorge Carlos Naranjo Alcaide MCCJ