A group of citizens in El Daein, the capital city of Sudan’s East Darfur State, has launched an initiative to ‘discourage’ carrying of guns in public places and attacks on public utilities and private property.
Osman Masabal, the supervisor of the popular initiative in El Daein town, told Radio Tamazuj Saturday that the initiative aims to combat practices such as the sale of illicit drugs in public places and carrying of guns after the proliferation of firearms in the hands of civilians after the war broke out in the country.
Musabal pointed out that they want to conduct public awareness campaigns in the El Daein market to urge citizens to discourage bad practices and accept one another.
“The main challenge facing us now is the random shooting of guns into the air, but we are trying to intensify our campaign so that we bring it to an end. Also, there are cases of kidnappings, but they are stopping slowly,” he said.
Muhammad Issa Dagash, a resident of El Daein town, said that the initiative has many benefits and thanked the young people for coming up with such an initiative. He pointed out that there is an increase in bad practices, such as selling illicit drugs and carrying guns in the market.
“We used to see a lot of practices like random shooting of guns into the air, sale of drugs, and carrying of guns randomly after the war broke out. So these young people are working hard to discourage those things, and the community is responding to the campaign, and their message is spreading very fast,” he said.
Dheif Al-Zein, another resident of El Daein, praised the efforts of the youth and native administration leaders in coming up with a campaign to combat negative practices, saying there is a huge vacuum created by the absence of police and security services after the war.
East Darfur is one of the Sudanese states that witness relative stability.
The war in Sudan broke out on April 15.
The army, led by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, has been battling the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces commanded by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, after the two fell out in a power struggle.
More than 9,000 people have been killed in the conflict so far, according to a conservative estimate by the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data project.
The fighting has displaced almost 4.3 million people within Sudan, while 1.2 million more have fled abroad, UN figures show.