Farouk Abu Issa (; 12 August 1933 – 12 April 2020) was a

Sudan Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Libya to the northwest, Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the east, Eritrea and Ethiopi ...

ese politician and the Chairman of the

National Consensus Forces The National Consensus Forces (NCF, ''Ij’maa'') is a coalition of political parties in Sudan that opposed the rule of the National Congress Party, and was initially formed to stand against the NCP in the 2010 Sudanese elections. Farouk Abu Is ...

. Abu Issa attended the prestigious Hantoub Secondary School and was involved in activism from a young age; he joined the

Sudanese Communist Party The Sudanese Communist Party ( abbr. SCP; ) is a communist party in Sudan. Founded in 1946, it was a major force in Sudanese politics in the early post-independence years, and was one of the two most influential communist parties in the Arab ...

in 1950. His father was a member of the political party Ashiqqa' and supported peace between Sudan and Egypt. Abu Issa graduated from

Alexandria University Alexandria University () is a public university in Alexandria, Egypt. It was established in 1938 as a satellite of Fouad University (the name of which was later changed to Cairo University), becoming an independent entity in 1942. It was known as ...

with a degree in law in 1957 and subsequently joined the

Egyptian Communist Party The Egyptian Communist Party (ECP; ) is a revolutionary Marxist–Leninist communist party in Egypt. History and profile The modern Egyptian Communist Party (ECP) was formed in 1975 by a number of members of the former Egyptian Communist Par ...

. He was Sudanese Foreign Minister under

Jaafar Nimeiry Gaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry (otherwise spelled in English as Gaafar Nimeiry, Jaafar Nimeiry, or Ja'far Muhammad Numayri; ; 1 January 193030 May 2009) was a Sudanese military officer and politician who served as the fourth head of state of Sudan ...

from 1969 to 1971. When the

split from Nimeiry in 1970, Abu Issa withdrew from the party, though he continued to hold democratic sentiments. In 1983, he was elected as the Secretary General of the Arab Lawyers Union; he held this position until 2003. He fled to Egypt in 1989 after

Omar al-Bashir Omar Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir (born 1 January 1944) is a Sudanese former military officer and politician who served as Head of state of Sudan, Sudan's head of state under various titles from 1989 until 2019, when he was deposed in 2019 Sudanese c ...

overtook the government and stayed in exile until 2005 when the

Comprehensive Peace Agreement The Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA, ), also known as the Naivasha Agreement, was an accord signed on 9 January 2005, by the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) and the Government of Sudan. The CPA was meant to end the Second Sudane ...

was signed. He became the chairman of the National Consensus Forces' general council and held this position until his death in 2020. In December 2014 he was arrested along with

Amin Mekki Medani Amin Mekki Medani (2 February 1939 – 31 August 2018) (Arabic: د. ٱمين مكي مدني) was a Sudanese lawyer, diplomat, human rights and political activist. He was the president of the Confederation of Sudanese Civil Society, Vice Pres ...

, held in

Kobar Prison Kobar Prison (), formerly known as Cooper prison, is one of the oldest prisons in Sudan, dating back to 1903. It was built by the administration of the former Anglo-Egyptian Sudan (1899–1956) and was named Kobar in Arabic after the Britis ...

, and subsequently charged with undermining the constitutional system. He was released from prison two and a half weeks later and taken to a hospital in

Khartoum Khartoum or Khartum is the capital city of Sudan as well as Khartoum State. With an estimated population of 7.1 million people, Greater Khartoum is the largest urban area in Sudan. Khartoum is located at the confluence of the White Nile – flo ...

due to rapidly deteriorating health.

References

1933 births 2020 deaths Alexandria University alumni Foreign ministers of Sudan {{Sudan-politician-stub