OUR VISION
SDFG’s vision is a democratic, inclusive Sudan where justice, equality, peace and development prevail.
OUR MISSION
SDFG considers the promotion of inclusive democracy in Sudan its main mission. As part of this, SDFG is committed to work against marginalization (whether based on culture, ethnicity, class, gender, region, age, religion, or political affiliation) by providing platforms for inclusive and transparent engagement of all Sudanese citizens in political decision making and their participation and expression in the public sphere. SDFG’s interventions are guided by the values of transparency, accountability and credibility.
FOUNDING MOMENTUM AND PRINCIPLES
The objectives, positions, and interventions of SDFG reflect a coherent vision of how to address Sudan’s major challenges in respect to achieving peace, justice, democracy and development. In line with the convictions of the members of SDFG, SDFG’s guiding principles and starting points for action include:
• The commitment of a like-minded group of actors who are driven by principled positions rather than temporary compromises and/or individual interests;
• The need for a rallying civil society movement which can counter the ambiguity, confusion and fragmentation experienced by independent civil society since the government crack-down, helping genuine advocates for human rights and democracy to have a strong voice in the political debate;
• The importance of creating a channel for the concerns and interests of those Sudanese who have been excluded—whether because of repression, lack of access to information and freedom expression or poverty—to be heard in public domain;
• A conviction that breaking the monopoly of traditional political forces on the public and political sphere is essential for change—this should also involve assisting those forces to transform through transfusion of the approaches and insights of civil society and other genuine social movements based on democratic and inclusive principles;
• The need for building partnerships with regional and international organizations to inject Sudanese perspectives in their advocacy messaging: SDFG resists paternalistic, neo-colonial interventions that do not reflect the will of the Sudanese people;
• The significance of promoting the values of solidarity, protection and cooperation among independent democratic civil society and civic actors through creating and providing support to individuals and groups that face challenges, including through mobilization of Sudanese resources;
• A determination to maintain an independent inclusive identity for SDFG that is built on a clear and principled vision and objectives, and which is resistant to both hijacking by political forces and reduction to a traditional “NGOing model”;
• The urgency of ensuring that as many diverse voices as possible, particularly among independent/ democratic agents, feed into solving the huge challenges facing Sudan’s stability, peace, justice and democracy, including the search for the re-definition and transformation of Sudan as a nation-state and the re-conception of a meaningful Sudanese equal citizenship.
