Gaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry (otherwise spelled in English as Gaafar Nimeiry, Jaafar Nimeiry, or Ja'far Muhammad Numayri; Arabic: جعفر محمد النميري; 1 January 1930[2][3] – 30 May 2009[4]) was a Sudanese military officer and politician who served as the fourth head of state of Sudan from 1969 to 1985, first as Chairman of the National Revolutionary Command Council and then as President.

In 1971 Nimeiry survived a pro-Soviet coup attempt, after which he forged an alliance with Mao Zedong of China, and, eventually, with the United States as well.

He also earned a Master of Military Science from Army Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, United States in 1966.

[9] On 25 May 1969, together with four other officers, Colonel Nimeiry, commanding the Khartoum Garrison, overthrew the civilian government of Ismail al-Azhari, his coup being termed the "May Revolution".

"[10] On 26 May, he suspended the constitution, dissolved the Supreme Council, the National Assembly, and the Civil Service Commission, and ordered that all political parties disband.

In March–April 1970 Nimeiry ordered an aerial bombardment on Aba Island which killed several thousand Ansar, who were associated with the Umma Party which opposed him.

In late 1975, a military coup by Communist members of the armed forces, led by Brigadier Hassan Hussein Osman, failed to remove Nimeiry from power.

[16] In the mid-1970s, he launched several initiatives to develop agriculture and industry in Sudan and he invited foreign Western and Chinese companies to explore for oil.

In 1976, a force of one thousand insurgents under Sadiq al Mahdi, armed and trained by Libya, crossed the border from Ma'tan as-Sarra.

After passing through Darfur and Kordofan, the insurgents engaged in three days of house-to-house fighting in Khartoum and Omdurman that killed some 3,000 people and sparked national resentment against the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

A limited measure of pluralism was allowed and Sadiq al Mahdi and members of the Democratic Unionist Party joined the legislature under the umbrella of the Sudan Socialist Union.

Hassan al-Turabi, an Islamist leader who had been imprisoned and then exiled after the May Revolution, was invited back and became Justice Minister and Attorney General in 1979.

[18] Nimeiry was one of only two Arab leaders (the other being Qaboos bin Said of Oman) who maintained close relations with Anwar Sadat after the Camp David Accords of 1978.

In 1981, Nimeiry, pressured by his Islamic opponents, began a dramatic shift toward Islamist political governance and allied himself with the Muslim Brotherhood.

Eight doctors', lawyers' and university lecturers' associations called for a protest on 3 April and a "general political strike until the abolition of the current regime".

[22] On 6 April 1985, while Nimeiry was on an official visit to the United States of America in the hope of gaining more financial aid from Washington, a bloodless military coup led by his defence minister General Abdel Rahman Swar al-Dahab ousted him from power.

In 2005, Nimeiry's party, the Alliance of the Peoples' Working Forces signed a merger agreement with the ruling National Congress of Sudan.

After Nimeiry's death in May 2009, former Revolutionary Command Council member Khaled Hassan Abbass was elected head of the Alliance of Peoples' Working Forces.