VZCZCXRO8608
RR RUEHGI RUEHMA RUEHROV
DE RUEHNJ #0474 1581332
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 071332Z JUN 07
FM AMEMBASSY NDJAMENA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 5362
INFO RUCNFUR/DARFUR COLLECTIVE
RUEHTRO/AMEMBASSY TRIPOLI 0415

UNCLAS NDJAMENA 000474 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PHUM CD SU
SUBJECT: CHAD/SUDAN:  MASALIT RESTIVENESS 
 
¶1. (SBU)  Summary:  A new Darfur rebel group is being formed 
composed of Masalit who object to control by Zaghawans, 
whether Chadian or Darfurian.  The group may not get off the 
ground, but its formation is indicative of the splintering 
trend among the Darfur rebels and dissatisfaction among 
Masalit.  End summary. 
 
¶2.  Djabadine Hissein, a Sudanese Masalit resident off and on 
for many years in Ndjamena, called on poloff June 6.  He said 
that the Masalit (concentrated in West Darfur although 
Djabadine himself comes from south of Khartoum, where a 
significant Masalit population migrated decades ago) were fed 
up with their secondary role in the Darfur rebellion.  He 
said that the Masalit had not had a significant role in the 
instigation of the Darfur rebellion and now had only a few 
significant leaders in the rebel movements.  But, he said, a 
disproportionate number of the rebel fighters (most of them, 
he claimed) had been Masalit since the beginning of the 
conflict.  He said he was part of a group of Masalit who are 
forming a new faction which hoped to give the Masalit a 
leadership role in the rebellion commensurate with their 
fighting role. 
 
¶3.  According to Djabadine, the new Masalit faction -- which 
as yet has taken no specific name -- is being spearheaded by 
Abderrahman Ibrahim Shigaf and al-Sadiq al-Karim.  The former 
is a cousin of the Masalit sultan Sa'd Bahr al-Din (who, he 
said, is a lackey of the Sudanese government).  The latter is 
to be the new group's military leader.  Djabadine is the No. 
3, or secretary general.  He claims that the group has 
widespread Masalit support but no backing from any external 
party (e.g., Islamists, Libya, Eritrea, or Chad) other than 
Masalit expatriates.  They want to continue the rebellion, do 
not want to add to disunity among the rebels, but insist that 
the Masalit, who do most of the fighting, must no longer be 
dominated by "nomads" -- whether Darfurian Zaghawans or the 
Chadian Zaghawan regime or Arabs. 
 
¶4.  Djabadine said that the two significant Masalit rebel 
leaders -- Khamis Abdulla and Ibrahim Yahya -- are 
discredited among the Masalit, and they will probably not be 
part of the new group.  Ibrahim Yahya was, heretofore, the 
only Masalit in the JEM leadership, but he split from Khalil 
Ibrahim in recent days.  Dajabine said that he was in active 
contact with Ibrahim Yahya, but because the latter is an 
Islamist and Turabist, like Khalil Ibrahim, he does not trust 
him.  The new Masalit faction is anti-Islamist. 
 
¶5.  As for Khamis Abulla, who has been a leader in the 
nonsignatory SLA since the SLA split up in the wake of the 
Abuja accord in May 2006, he has become a non-factor. 
Djabadine said that Khamis Abdulla has alienated the mass of 
the Masalit populace.  The reason is that President Deby has 
used the Masalit fighters under Khamis Abdulla as a force to 
attack Chadian rebels.  The new Masalit faction is, he said, 
determined to avoid distracting the rebellion from its real 
objective and being manipulated by the Chadian Zaghawan 
regime.  However, Djabadine claimed, Khamis Abdulla is now 
also discredited in Deby's eyes, after his visit last month 
to Ndjamena, and he has "fled" to Eritrea.  Meanwhile, the 
new faction is also finding it tough to cope in Ndjamena and 
is looking around to set up  in a new country, perhaps 
temporarily Tanzania. 
 
¶6.  Note on Djabadine Hissein:  Aged 57, he claims to be a 
former Sudanese military officer and to have fled Sudan in 
1975 for Chad.  He says he was close to former Chadian 
President Goukouni Weddeye and to have participated in Deby's 
ouster of Habre.  Deby's half-brother Daoussa used him, for a 
time, for sensitive missions related to Sudan, most recently 
in 1997 to see Hasan al-Turabi in Khartoum to discuss an SPLA 
plan to destabilize Chad due to Deby's then-closeness to the 
Sudanese regime.  (The mission, he says, was thwarted by 
Turabi's close associates and then-senior Sudanese officials 
Jabir and Khalil Ibrahim, the latter of whom is now head of 
JEM.)  Djabadine said that he has been largely inactive ever 
since, operating "under the radar" mostly in Ndjamena. 
 
¶7.  Comment:  This new faction may be nothing more than a 
pipe dream in the eyes of a handful of Masalit milling around 
Ndjamena.  But mounting disaffection among the Masalit seems 
plausible enough.  And this overture to us, laying out a new, 
ethnic-based faction, is one further sign of mounting 
disunity among the Darfur rebels. 
WALL