 In 1971, President Gaafar Nimeiry launched a wave of repression against the party after a failed coup implicated the involvement of some communist military officers.The party's best known leaders; Abdel Khaliq Mahjub, Joseph Garang, Alshafi Ahmed Elshikh, Babkir Elnour and Hashem al Atta were executed and the party was officially banned, but some SCP politicians did manage to enter the government.It was one of the main opposition parties to Omar al-Bashir's regime, and is currently in opposition to Abdel Fattah al-Burhan's Transitional Military Council and the measures enacted by the 2019 Sudanese coup d'état.