Yemen's Next Crises: Giving Saleh the Push May Have Been the Easy Part
By <
http://www.time.com/time/letters/email_letter.html> Tom Finn / Sana'a
Tuesday, Nov. 29, 2011
A rare moment of jubilation erupted in Sana'a on Nov. 23 as Yemenis gathered
around their television sets to watch their ruler, Ali Abdullah Saleh, sign
a deal transferring power to his deputy, effectively ending his 33-year grip
on power. Grainy images on state TV showed a grinning Saleh seated next to
Saudi King Abdullah in an ornate palace hall in Riyadh. Saleh chuckled
briefly as he signed four copies of the U.S.-backed proposal which will see
him retain the honorary title of President until a new head of state is
elected in February. He then joined in on an ensuing round of applause.
"This disagreement for the last 10 months has had a big impact on Yemen in
the realms of culture, development, politics, which led to a threat to
national unity and destroyed what has been built in past years," he told a
flock of Saudi sheiks, foreign ambassadors and tired-looking U.N. diplomats
perched on a line of gold-crested chairs. "I declare the turning of a new
page in the history of Yemen," said King Abdullah in a closing statement
after the signing ceremony.
<
http://lightbox.time.com/2011/10/31/yemens-change-square-occupy-sanaa/>
(See photos from Yemen's Change Square in Sana'a.)
Saleh had balked at a signing on three previous occasions, and so seeing the
deed done and attested too came as a relief to many Yemenis, exhausted and
terrified after almost 10 months of bloodshed, political deadlock, soaring
food and petrol prices, daily power cuts and an imploding economy. Fireworks
and celebratory gunfire crackled overhead as hordes of people descended on
Change Square, the sprawling tented shantytown in the heart of the capital
where pro-democracy demonstrators have been camped out in their thousands
since February. Fathers hoisted wriggling toddlers onto their shoulders as a
group of grizzly-bearded tribesmen performed the bara - the traditional
dagger dance - on a makeshift wooden stage, twirling the curved blades above
their heads to cries of "Goodbye ya Ali, the tyrant has fled!"
For now all eyes are on Abd-Rabbua Mansour Hadi, Yemen's 66-year-old Vice
President, who will assume caretaker responsibility for the government in
the interim. Despite harking from the southern province of Abyan, Hadi, an
ex-military commander, stuck by Saleh during the brutal 1994 civil war
(South Yemen was an independent state governed by socialists until it was
merged with the north in 1990). His loyalty earned him the title of Vice
President, which he has clung to ever since. Forced to operate in Saleh's
shadow, Hadi has never been a strong player on the Yemeni political scene
and many still see him as an al-zumra, one of Saleh's token men from the
south: smart, well connected but ultimately politically weak. (See photos of
Yemen on the brink.)
<
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,2076292,00.html>
The last time Hadi was acting head of state, Saleh was recuperating in a
Saudi hospital after a booby-trap explosion ripped through his presidential
mosque in June. Western officials tried to court Hadi as if he were the
acting power in Yemen, but it was clear who was ruling the roost when Ahmed
Saleh, the President's temperamental son and commander of the Republican
Guard, locked the Vice President out of the presidential palace and forced
him to work from home. As long as the Saleh boys are breathing down his
neck, Hadi will struggle to stamp his authority on the country.
Hadi's weakness, among several other factors, has tainted the excitement
over Saleh's signing the agreement with skepticism and anger. Skepticism
because the regime remains largely intact, with Saleh safely sheltered in
his palace and his sons and nephews still occupying the upper echelons of
the military and intelligence services. And anger because the deal, backed
by the U.S. and the U.N., includes an instruction to Yemeni lawmakers to
grant Saleh and his family immunity from prosecution - despite widespread
corruption allegations and hundreds of protesters shot dead in recent months
by government troops.
A rare moment of jubilation erupted in Sana'a on Nov. 23 as Yemenis gathered
around their television sets to watch their ruler, Ali Abdullah Saleh, sign
a deal transferring power to his deputy, effectively ending his 33-year grip
on power. Grainy images on state TV showed a grinning Saleh seated next to
Saudi King Abdullah in an ornate palace hall in Riyadh. Saleh chuckled
briefly as he signed four copies of the U.S.-backed proposal which will see
him retain the honorary title of President until a new head of state is
elected in February. He then joined in on an ensuing round of applause.
"This disagreement for the last 10 months has had a big impact on Yemen in
the realms of culture, development, politics, which led to a threat to
national unity and destroyed what has been built in past years," he told a
flock of Saudi sheiks, foreign ambassadors and tired-looking U.N. diplomats
perched on a line of gold-crested chairs. "I declare the turning of a new
page in the history of Yemen," said King Abdullah in a closing statement
after the signing ceremony.
<
http://lightbox.time.com/2011/10/31/yemens-change-square-occupy-sanaa/>
(See photos from Yemen's Change Square in Sana'a.)
Saleh had balked at a signing on three previous occasions, and so seeing the
deed done and attested too came as a relief to many Yemenis, exhausted and
terrified after almost 10 months of bloodshed, political deadlock, soaring
food and petrol prices, daily power cuts and an imploding economy. Fireworks
and celebratory gunfire crackled overhead as hordes of people descended on
Change Square, the sprawling tented shantytown in the heart of the capital
where pro-democracy demonstrators have been camped out in their thousands
since February. Fathers hoisted wriggling toddlers onto their shoulders as a
group of grizzly-bearded tribesmen performed the bara - the traditional
dagger dance - on a makeshift wooden stage, twirling the curved blades above
their heads to cries of "Goodbye ya Ali, the tyrant has fled!"
For now all eyes are on Abd-Rabbua Mansour Hadi, Yemen's 66-year-old Vice
President, who will assume caretaker responsibility for the government in
the interim. Despite harking from the southern province of Abyan, Hadi, an
ex-military commander, stuck by Saleh during the brutal 1994 civil war
(South Yemen was an independent state governed by socialists until it was
merged with the north in 1990). His loyalty earned him the title of Vice
President, which he has clung to ever since. Forced to operate in Saleh's
shadow, Hadi has never been a strong player on the Yemeni political scene
and many still see him as an al-zumra, one of Saleh's token men from the
south: smart, well connected but ultimately politically weak.
<
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,2076292,00.html> (See photos
of Yemen on the brink.)
The last time Hadi was acting head of state, Saleh was recuperating in a
Saudi hospital after a booby-trap explosion ripped through his presidential
mosque in June. Western officials tried to court Hadi as if he were the
acting power in Yemen, but it was clear who was ruling the roost when Ahmed
Saleh, the President's temperamental son and commander of the Republican
Guard, locked the Vice President out of the presidential palace and forced
him to work from home. As long as the Saleh boys are breathing down his
neck, Hadi will struggle to stamp his authority on the country.
Hadi's weakness, among several other factors, has tainted the excitement
over Saleh's signing the agreement with skepticism and anger. Skepticism
because the regime remains largely intact, with Saleh safely sheltered in
his palace and his sons and nephews still occupying the upper echelons of
the military and intelligence services. And anger because the deal, backed
by the U.S. and the U.N., includes an instruction to Yemeni lawmakers to
grant Saleh and his family immunity from prosecution - despite widespread
corruption allegations and hundreds of protesters shot dead in recent months
by government troops.
<
http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,812528345001_2056741,00.html>
Watch TIME's video of Yemen's volatile uprising.
Read more:
<
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2100431,00.html#ixzz1f8Yr8QoF
>
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2100431,00.html#ixzz1f8Yr8QoF
Read more:
<
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2100431,00.html#ixzz1f8YhIf9V
>
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2100431,00.html#ixzz1f8YhIf9V
------------[ Sent via the dehai-wn mailing list by dehai.org]--------------
Received on Tue Nov 29 2011 - 17:45:05 EST