Waves of Exorbitant Price Hikes and the Ineffectiveness of Government Policies
(Translated)
Al-Rayah Newspaper - Issue 600 - 20/05/2026
By: Ustadh Yaqoub Ibrahim – Wilayah Sudan

Sudan is witnessing significant increases in fuel prices, triggering a wave of exorbitant inflation that has affected all basic commodities, including bread, transportation fares, and electricity. Adding insult to injury, the government’s decision to raise the customs dollar exchange rate by 14%, setting it at 3,222 Sudanese pounds, has sent prices soaring to unprecedented levels. This has defied all expectations, disrupting markets and paralyzing commercial activity. Millions of Sudanese, already struggling to make ends meet, have lost their homes and livelihoods as a result of the devastating American war.

This wave of inflation has created a catastrophic situation, as described by the International Organization for Migration, which states that 86% of families are struggling to purchase their needs due to low income, high inflation, and disruption of local markets. According to a report published by Al Jazeera on December 29, 2025, the poverty rate has risen from 21% in 2022 to 71% currently, amid deteriorating public services, declining family income, and the loss of livelihoods and sources of income for most of the population.

The Global Report on Food Crises, the leading international reference for monitoring and assessing hunger crises, published by the Global Network Against Food Crises - a coalition of the United Nations, the European Union, and major international organizations including the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Food Programme (WFP), the World Bank, and UNICEF) - warned that the situation will not improve by 2026.

What Sudan is experiencing is not a temporary emergency crisis, but instead part of a chronic, cumulative pattern that has crippled the country’s ability to recover, with each new shock piling upon the ruins of previous ones.

To confront these accumulating disasters, the current government, and previous governments - the Salvation, Transitional, and Coup Government- turned to international financial institutions to discuss the issue of loans and their scheduling, and to remove obstacles preventing access to them, especially the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and others, disregarding the fact that these are colonial institutions that impose harsh conditions enabling them to control the wealth of targeted countries.

This was expressed by the American economist, John Perkins, a whistle blowing global economic hitmen, in his book “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man,” saying, “Thus, we make loans to countries like Ecuador with the full knowledge that they will never repay them; in fact, we do not want them to honor their debts, since the nonpayment is what gives us our leverage, our pound of flesh.” Similarly, as one international economic expert described it, “Its outward appearance is merciful, but its inner reality is torment.” He added, “It always presents itself as a helper, supporter, and benefactor, but in reality, it is a destroyer and saboteur of many economies it has infiltrated through foreign currency financing... It is often the one that creates these crises after plunging countries into debt and imposing economic prescriptions that exacerbate their suffering rather than cure it.”

The problem of high prices has clear causes, and those responsible are also well-known: the prescriptions of the IMF and the World Bank, implemented by puppet rulers and politicians infatuated with a capitalist civilization that poses a danger to human life. Among these prescriptions are; the devaluation of the local currency against other currencies, the removal of subsidies, and the unification of the exchange rate by raising the value of the customs dollar and striving to liberalize it. These were the policies that the Salvation Government began to implement, which was a great shock to the people. Then successive governments accelerated in moving in this direction. In March 2021, the Transitional Government announced an increase in the customs dollar by 33%, from 15 pounds to 20 pounds, and rushed to implement this deadly policy until the price of the customs dollar reached 3,222 pounds in the first third of this year, 2026! The Sudanese Minister of Finance, Jibril Ibrahim, said, “The customs dollar is an innovation in the Sudanese economy and a legacy of the previous regime.”

Among the most destructive policies is pegging the country’s currency to the dollar, the currency of the leading power with designs on Muslim lands. With policies of devaluing the local currency, this leading power can cripple and strangle other countries, tightening the noose of dependency around their necks.

Another cause of inflation is the policy of privatization and the transfer of public properties to individuals and companies. The plan Sudan developed to join the World Trade Organization indicates support for policies that incentivize the private sector, after the state withdrew from managing economic affairs, leaving 75% of the economy to the private sector.

Further contributing factors to inflation are the stifling of local production and the squandering of Sudan's vast resources. For example, wheat production in Sudan is projected to decline to 400,000 tons in the 2025 season, representing only a quarter of the country's needs of 1.6 million tons, which is a massive catastrophe.

The complete dependence on global, colonialist, riba (interest) based financial institutions is what has produced the current reality of misery, hardship, and suffering endured by the Muslims of Sudan. Experts believe that the most dangerous aspect of these policies is the significant increase in the prices of both local and imported goods to record levels, which means an increase in poverty both quantitatively and qualitatively, pushing large segments of the population into the cycle of poverty.

The government’s compliance with these prescriptions and their faithful implementation have only exacerbated the suffering of the poor and delighted the enemies of the regime. David Malpass, President of the World Bank Group, stated, “I congratulate the Government of Sudan on its commitment to reform and look forward to greater opportunities for the World Bank Group to support the Sudanese people.” The US Embassy also welcomed the Sudanese government's decision to float the pound, describing it as a “courageous decision.”

The government then went even further, confirming the futility of its economic policies and its lack of direction. Prime Minister Kamil Idris recklessly announced a ban on the import of a wide range of food items, consumer goods, and industrial inputs, 46 diverse commodities, sparking a wave of criticism. The head of the Sudanese National Chamber of Importers described the decision as “flawed, harmful to the Sudanese economy, and ill-conceived.”

The government’s floundering and reliance on poisoned aid and handouts only serve to enable colonial powers to plunder Sudan's resources. These capitalists worship money to the point of reverence, a sentiment echoed by Nick Checker, senior official at the Bureau of African Affairs, in a statement issued by the US State Department on March 19, 2026, “The United States is resetting its relationship with Africa based on mutually beneficial partnerships rather than aid, dependency, and spreading divisive ideology. Everything we do is guided by the Trump Administration’s 2025 National Security Strategy, which in the clearest terms in the post-Cold War era lays out our singular global prioritization and focuses on protecting and advancing our “core national interests.” Yet foolish governments fawn over and desperately seek this poisonous aid.

Addressing the problem of inflation and deteriorating economic conditions by clinging to the IMF and the World Bank, and by implementing the conditions of global usurious institutions, is tantamount to blatant suicide. The government would be suffocating itself and its people with destructive economic prescriptions that have produced inflation, poverty, and destitution, and have ruined everything; farm, livestock, trees, and even the land itself.

Humanity today is in dire need of someone to rescue it from the savage capitalist system that has inflicted the evils of inflation upon the world. The world has no alternative but the Khilafah Rashidah (Rightly Guided Caliphate) on the Method of the Prophethood, which precisely defines the economic problem as the poverty of individuals. It would unleash potential and operate according to the economic system brought by Islam, guaranteeing the fulfillment of the people's needs and striving to eradicate poverty and inflation, leading to a life filled with happiness and divine favor.