 Hello and welcome to NewsClick. Today, we look at major developments in the North African region over the past one month. In the beginning of the month, Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika was forced to design after massive protests. Similarly, on the 11th of April, Sudanian President Omar al-Bashir, who had been in power for 30 years, was also forced to quit. To talk more about these developments, we have with us Prabir Burqaisa. Hello, Prabir. Prabir, so many people are actually calling the developments in Algeria and Sudan almost a second Arab Spring, because the nature of the protests are the same. They have been longer, in fact. In Sudan, it started in December, and Algeria also, it went on for quite some time. And in both cases, we see that two powerful figureheads who had dominated the region for a long time were forced to resign. At the same time, it has not meant a complete change in the political structure. For instance, in Sudan, the army has come to power with transitional counsel. And even in Algeria, people part of the old regime have come back to power, are still in power. So how do you see these developments in the regional context as a whole? You know, it's a very difficult thing to take a crystal ball and predict the future. So I think that's something that we can only talk about in terms of possibilities, but not in terms of what's really going to happen, because that's something we don't know. I think there are similarities to Arab Spring, and there are also things which are different. One of the similarities to Arab Spring is, of course, that the long periods of, shall we say, authoritarian governments, which had some sanction, let's put it this way, Algerian military rule, had a large amount of civilian and social sanction as well, because it came from earlier history of nationalist struggle against the French. And then also the Islamists' attack, which had taken place, which had divided Algeria quite badly. And the army, therefore, came across as a party which could control a civilian structure and also provide a secular structure to the country. So these were things which also gave a certain degree of, shall we say, legitimacy to the military in Algeria. It's a revolutionary military force. It's not an usual, shall we say, colonial army which takes over. So that's not the way it happened. I think what's important is that we see now that people are saying we need Mopar. We don't accept what you are doing in our name, and we need Mopar. And we need also structures through which we can express ourselves. Now, to that extent, it is common to what happened in Arab Spring. But you know, the Arab Spring had also two different impulses, if you see it now, that there is this element which was anti-authoritarian, which rose against certain forms of military rule in some places, but also against civilian rule backed by strong authoritarian structure. So Tunisia was really an authoritarian structure, quite corrupt, and not available to, shall we say, people's pressures. You had Egypt, which was going through military dictatorship for a long time, and where the military pretended that it was also the civilian administration, but it had arrogated to itself major powers. Now, in this case, you will see that both Tunisia and Egypt, we had a Muslim, or Islamist Muslim brotherhood, both were important over there. They behaved differently in the two places. Tunisia, you have still a civilian administration. You still have democracy in terms of elections. Well, in Egypt you don't, because the Muslim brotherhood that took place in Egypt decided that it had got total authority to do anything it wanted. And the pushback brought back again a military regime in Egypt. What's going to happen in Sudan and Algeria is an open question. Both places, military is still involved in the administration. It's clear they believe that they will hold the governments together, whatever form that comes in, comes into being. It's also clear that the civilians are not going to rest till they have some share in the power, that this anti-authoritarian upsurge that is taking place is also trying to learn from the lessons of what happened in Egypt, what happened in other places, and therefore becoming a little more cautious, wanting to look at alternatives. I must also say that this Arab Spring that we are talking about in the first phase also led to essentially Islamist uprisings backed by NATO powers against secular governments, which might have been authoritarian, but the secular governments, like for instance Libya and Syria, and the attempt there was to really pave the way for Israel's dominance of the area and therefore the targeting of Syria, which was clearly recognized as a party, a government which had rejected the so-called peace accord that was struck between Israel and Egypt, and also Libya, which not only was a party to this kind of rejectionist model, which Syria was at that time is leading and supporting the Palestinians, but also Libya was a major opposition force in the organization of African Union, and therefore the NATO, particularly the United States, saw Gaddafi, even when he had actually made up with the West or with the NATO powers, as an enemy who needed to be dethroned so to say, so that in Africa they can then control the region much more effectively, which they effectively have, they are actually doing now, where after Gaddafi has fallen or has been murdered or overthrown, whichever way you want to put it. And it's interesting you mentioned learning the lessons of the Arab Spring, because I think one of the key arguments that many both in Algeria and Sudan are making is very much the same, and it's all the more important right now, because in Egypt we have LCC doing a referendum, which actually seeks to consolidate his power and remove term limits, which is one of the major achievements of the 2011 round of protests. So there is I think a considerable amount of consciousness that this has to actually be completely avoided. That is one of the other part of it. If we look at Sudan, I think the fall of the Sudanese military rule in this sense, if it happens, would also mean that the Saudi Arabia, Sudan, United Arab Emirates axis, which is invaded Yemen. Now of course Yemen is being bombed mercilessly with the help of the NATO forces, particularly the United States and United Kingdom. It has committed all kinds of war crimes on the ground, bombed marriages, bombed schools, hospitals, all infrastructure, stopped all food from coming into Yemen. We know that there is a huge number of people today at risk from starvation. We know that the entire public health system has collapsed. So we have the, we have upsurge of cholera, diseases which are entirely preventable coming in a huge way into Yemen. And though the United States Congress passed a resolution against the Yemen war or US participation in the war, Trump has vetoed it, proving that he's never been a peace stick and he is not even an isolationist. He is as much of a warmonger as Hillary Clinton was. If we take Sudan now, if this uprising in Sudan leads to Sudan's withdrawing from that coalition of quote unquote the alliance which has invaded Yemen, they actually provide the major armed forces over there. I think that will be a huge change in the Yemen war because Sudan keeping out of that war and Sudan was really acting as a mercenary armed force for Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates. So I think that would be very interesting that if that happens that Sudan withdraws from the war not because it's politically withdrawing from the war, but because of its problems internal to Sudan, I think that would be huge relief to the Yemenis. And because Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates have no soldiers, they really cannot fight the ground war. The only reason they're surviving is the fact that all other forces including NATO forces are supporting them in different ways. And if the Sudanis do not operate in Yemen, then the only others will be the mercenary forces they have collected from all over the world that's expensive and difficult to maintain and does not have a proper structure of an army which the Sudanis do. So I think that would be a huge change for the Yemen war if it happens. And what you're indicating is also that basically there may be around three models of the first Arab Spring basically. One is Egypt where there is a complete reversal. Libya which is completely destroyed and of course attempts to similarly make a destroy Syria also. And Tunisia which is sort of also despite number of issues also worked out some sort of middle path as of now and there is a constant space for struggle for progressive forces. So for both Algeria and Sudan these are basically some of the choices they'll have to make. Yes I think we have multiplicity of choices and obviously no country is going to copy what happened in another country. So each one is going to have a different path. And I would suspect that Sudan which went to a civil war separation of Sudan, South Sudan from North Sudan. This is also a lot of charges of genocide against the Sudanese forces. The fact that's also another fracture line which is the shall we say the sub-Saharan Africa and the north of the Saharas Africa which is euphemism for calling about the Arab and the other populations over there. So all these mixtures are there in Sudan so that makes it also a relatively more complex society and a complex political scenario that's going to unfold over there. Algeria is relatively more homogeneous though there is a Berber population which never really got recognition. Though the Algerians over through the French they still took the model of a kind of monocultural mono language, one language model in Algeria which never gave the Berber population its identity vis-à-vis the Arab population or the Arab speaking population. So I think all these fracture lines are also going to have to be negotiated afresh when you have the fall of an institution like the military which had political legitimacy in Algeria which it doesn't have. I think the Sudan case is even more complex because Algeria at least has oil wealth and therefore it has an advantage. Sudanese in that sense are also not endowed with lots of natural resources and a lot of the oil has gone to South Sudan. Therefore that was one of the reasons South Sudan was sought to be separated by imperial powers as well because the thought splitting up all these countries is favourable to the imperial powers who can grab the natural resources more easily. But we have to see how really Sudan pans out because I think Sudan is going to be the more difficult transition looking at all the players over there. Thank you Pappi. That's all we have time for today. Keep watching