Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

**Abdel Fattah Abdelrahman al-Burhan** (August 18, 1960 -) was a Sudanese born North African politician and army officer who served as the first President of the North African Federation from March 16, 2034 to April 1, 2035, having previously served as head of state of Sudan from 2019 to 2034. During his presidency, al-Burhan was also the leader of the African Federalist Party and is considered the founding father of the state of North Africa.

Al-Burhan was born in August 1960 in the village of Gandatu in northern Sudan. Al-Burhan studied elementary and intermediate level in his village school, and later moved to Shendi to complete his education before joining the Sudanese Military College in 1980 as a cadet. After graduating from the Military Academy, al-Burhan worked in Khartoum, as part of the Sudanese army, and participated in the fighting fronts in the Darfur war and in the Second Sudanese Civil War in southern Sudan and other regions. He was regional commander in Darfur. He later visited Egypt to receive training courses in his military field until in 2018 he was appointed commander of the ground forces of the army. Al-Burhan held several positions throughout his career as he began as a soldier with the Border Guard Forces and later became commander of this force before becoming Deputy Chief of Staff of the Ground Forces Operations and then Chief of Staff of the Sudanese Army in February 2018 before he served as Inspector General of the Army for a period of time. By 26 February 2019, during the massive protests that swept the country and demanded the fall of Omar al-Bashir's regime, al-Burhan was elevated to the rank of lieutenant general.

Following the ousting of President Omar al-Bashir in April 2019, lieutenant general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan became the *de-facto* military head of state of Sudan and one of the most powerful individuals in the country. Between 2019 and 2021, al-Burhan led a military-civilian government with the intention of eventually transitioning to democratic rule, but repeatedly foiled attempts to accelerate the democratic transition; in October 2021, al-Burhan led a coup d'état against his own transitional government and briefly ruled alone, before re-establishing a new transitional government in November 2021 after popular resistance to his coup. In April 2023, a civil war broke out between al-Burhan's armed forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, and finally concluded with a government victory in August 2026 after becoming a protracted conflict. Amid the 2027 Global Banking Crisis, Sudan began to ally itself with other neighbouring states in economic groupings in order to mitigate the worst effects of the crisis, and began a close diplomatic relationship with Persian president Geena Kulmuni after the two states agreed a banking relief plan in December 2027. Upon the formation of the Bovido Imperium in 2028, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan established a series of forums between states in northern Africa to encourage them to unite in the face of Bovido aggression in the region, and held several high profile meetings with Tunisian president Kais Saied to coordinate movements in the region. Under Saied, the nations of the Maghreb united into the United Arab Republic in 2030, but Sudan was excluded, prompting al-Burhan to relocate his unification movement to sub-Saharan Africa. Between 2030 and 2033, the proposal gained limited support, but became increasingly mainstream after the Bovido Imperium declared its intention to conquer northern Africa and invaded the Islamic Emirate of Egypt in September 2034.

After a brief period of negotiations between states in the region, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan was appointed as interim president of the newly formed North African Federation on March 16, 2034; the federation was a union of sixteen states in northern Africa, united by a shared federal government and constitution which protected the internal sovereignty of constituent states. On March 27, 2034, al-Burhan was elected to a full year-long term in office as president at the head of the African Federalist Party, itself a federated political party comprised of regional affiliate parties dedicated to the creation and preservation of a secular federal regime. During his presidency, al-Burhan presided over the increased integration of African states into the federation and the codification of specific federal and state powers through amendments to the constitution modelled off the United States constitution. A unique constitutional quirk established by President al-Burhan was the election of presidents to terms a year in advance of them taking office, meaning that before a president even took office, their successor would have been chosen in advance; due to the short one year terms as president, the procedure was accepted as a way to placate the individual states, who hoped for a rotating presidency between the states. However, whilst the governing African Federalist Party sought to establish a secular republican state in opposition to the Bovido Imperium, in late 2034 the newly formed Christian Loyalist Party began to rapidly expand in popularity as it mobilised the large Christian population of North Africa in opposition to secularism. During the 2035 general election, members of the Christian Loyalist Party won majorities in state legislatures across the country, prompting President Abdel Fattah al-Burhan to declare the state level elections as void in numerous regions; in response, CLP-backed militia groups began to attack government forces across the country, whilst the Christian Loyalist Party accused al-Burham's AFP of conducting a coup against democracy.

On April 1, 2035, amid the political upheaval following the 2035 general election, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan's presidential term expired and Yayi Boni of the AFP assumed the presidency the same day, with Jean Bagasauo of the CLP as vice president. Between April and August 2035, al-Burhan was a member of the Congress of North Africa, before being dismissed after Bagasauo seized full control over the government during the Red Wave. In the 2038 general election, al-Burhan returned to the congress as a representative.