Who are we now?

Recent news of British teacher Gillian Gibbons; a teddy bear called Mohammed and an encounter with the Sudanese Government has faded somewhat into the background with the dawn of a new year. The issues, however, are deeply rooted, and, still simmer beneath the surface.

What was it about Sudan and Mrs Gibbons that resulted in her humiliation and albeit brief incarceration?

I’ve been speaking to a North London businessman – let’s call him Mr Seth – who was educated at Comboni School in Khartoum – a Catholic school very like Unity High School where Mrs Gibbons taught.  He shares what it was like growing up as a minority in Sudan and then moving to England.  Seth is a Hindu, born and raised in Khartoum.  He has been living in London since the 1960s when he came here to study medicine, but switched to business and accounting.  He returned to visit Sudan about ten years ago and shared that it has changed. In the beginning, he narrates, Sudan was a land that none of the colonial powers wanted, except for Egypt and Britain. Britain wanted to keep Egypt in line, so it held on to Sudan for a time.

Reflecting on the Sudan of his youth, he states “Sudan’s climate is always harsh”, but not so the people.  The people were very welcoming and friendly.  He related a story, one that repeated itself at every meal time. When breakfast was about to be served, somewhere between 9 and 10 in the morning, all work stopped. Regardless of position or religion people gathered around the food to partake in a meal together.  If you happened to be passing by at that time, you would be invited to join. “Food”, Seth states of a Sudanese belief, “is a gift from God, there is no hierarchy with anything that has to do with God”. This was the Sudan of his youth. 

But Sudan feels it is self-sufficient now. It has oil and feels it no longer needs to listen to anyone anymore.

The second reason Seth gives for the change in Sudan is its Islamization. He tells me since about the mid 1980s, spiritual father of Sudan Hassan al-Turabi had been working towards this end and – despite being imprisioned himself for a time in 2005 – his vision has prevailed. The country Seth knows from his youth, one where he as a minority felt at home and connected, now has a sense of rigidity about it. He muses that a Muslim from anywhere in the world straight off the plane in Khartoum would have more rights than his father, a Hindu, who had lived in

Sudan for 58 years. “Religion is paramount,” he says, “You can talk about anything un der the sun, but not religion, that is off limits”. He says this was also true when he was younger, but that the Islamization has created a deeper division in the Sudanese psyche. There has always been an apparent mistrust of foreigners, but there is now a more overt distinction between people based on religion.

Seth explains that when he first came to the United Kingdom he felt as if he were “on another planet”. To him the British were like a “super-race” (his words); that he must have been very special to be allowed to come to London. He states that he loved the tolerance and the respect that the United Kingdom had offered him as a foreigner.  That has all changed. Today, he feels that because of globalisation and greed, people only ever think of themselves.  Each man is an island unto himself. Upon further reflection, Seth shares that London no longer has any identity. “Is this still an English city?  Or the UnitedNations?” he asks.  What does he think about multiculturalism? “It’s a waste of time”, he answers. “Look at the US or Australia, people are required to speak English when they come.” He refers to an article that wrote about a school in Haringey that had over 39 mother tongues spoken in the school. The issue he brings to light is that of unity. How can it exist if students cannot understand the language of their classmates? It creates tribalism.

In some ways, what he says is correct.  Scholars believe that one of the reasons Rome fell was because of tribalism in the ranks of the army. He states that those who come to this country and reap its financial benefits are often the first to complain about the United Kingdom.

He says: “I don’t want to be forced to accept the way of life of my host country, but I know I have to accept many of my host society’s ways and means.  If I don’t want to adopt them, then I shouldn’t come to this country.  Multiculturalism says that you don’t have to adopt - but that just doesn’t work for a society.

“Political correctness is extreme”.

Mrs Seth, born in Kenya and worried about family there with the current unrest, wonders why Britain doesn’t do more to undergird its own values, though from what Seth says, Britain seems a little lost in knowing what it values now.

He related a story of a time in the early 1970s where he was driving, and while driving pulled his last cigarette out of the pack and threw the rubbish out of the car window. He then noticed a car flashing its lights behind him, so he pulled over.  The lady driver chastised him for throwing the rubbish on the road: “You shouldn’t do that”, she says, “You should keep it clean”. He smiles as he remembers the story.  “That always stuck with me, I will always remember that”.  Today, he clarifies, one would never do that, you are too afraid you will be attacked.

“That is what I used to like about Britain, the respect”, he says.

Posted by CJ, Intern.