The 1985 military coup led to suspension of Sudan's 1973 constitution and its replacement with an interim constitution later in the year. One of the first acts of the Revolutionary Command Council for National Salvation after seizing power in 1989 was to abolish the interim constitution. President Omar Al-Bashir promised to prepare a new constitution. It was not until January 1998, however, that Sudan convened a constitutional conference to draft a constitution. It consisted of legal and political scholars representing different political groups sympathetic to al-Bashir’s rule. The Umma Party and the Democratic Unionist Party refused to participate. Most Southerners boycotted the conference. Voters in Sudan’s single-party system approved the constitution in a 1998 referendum, a process that raised questions about the degree to which the public accepted the document.