KHARTOUM (CWNews.com) - Sudan's Islamic government has
ordered state governors to convert government primary
schools into Muslim schools, according to a government
newspaper on Thursday.
Christians in the country expressed fears that the order
will increase hostility against the minority and undermine
their right to raise their children in their own faith.
Sudan has been split by civil war for two decades, pitting
the Arab, Muslim north against the Christian, African south.
President Omar Hassan al-Bashir announced the order on
Wednesday at a graduation ceremony for teachers. He said
the goal is to change society to enable it to live in
accordance with the teachings of the Koran.
"We thought the recent removal of the fundamentalist
Islamist Hassan al-Turabi from the center stage of Sudanese
politics would make the government more tolerant of other
religions but it appears nothing has changed," one teacher
at a school for refugee Christian Sudanese. Bashir sought
to curb the influence of Turabi, parliament speaker and
secretary general of the ruling National Congress party,
when he declared a three-month state of emergency and
dissolved parliament on December 12.
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