Opinion Yemen on the edge

Yemen is Arabia’s poorest state. The economy is struggling,the governance is ineffectual. Water and electricity are scarce in Sana’a. Yemenis call for the resignation of President Ali Abdullah Saleh,but he refuses to surrender control. He refuses to be another fallen dictator of the Arab Spring. But in “change squares” across the city,thousands continue to gather. Fridays are for both prayer and protest.

Southern Yemen in particular paints a scary picture: it has become a haven for al-Qaeda operatives. It is their new sanctuary,and that hasn’t gone unnoticed. Reports from the two southern townships,Abyan and Marib,tell stories of frequent American drone attacks. The most high-profile strike was less than a fortnight ago: Hellfire missiles rained on the car carrying al-Qaeda leader Anwar al-Awlaki,as he was crossing into Yemen.

You wonder,why Yemen? Has Saleh failed to unite a tribal society that refuses to bow down to the state? Is it because there is a division between the Shia north and the Sunni south? Answers can be found in the haphazard unification of Yemen in 1990.

The country was a pawn in the Cold War game,like Vietnam and Korea. The East-West rivalry saw southern Yemen allied with the Soviet Union and the north with the United States and Saudi Arabia. The end of the Cold War resulted in two developments: a stronger north and a weaker south and a powerful Saleh. And he developed the north at the expense of the south.

Saleh was then a skilful albeit cunning leader. He courted and coerced tribal leaders of the north into forming alliances with his government. Powerful tribesmen such as Abdullah bin Hussein al-Ahmar were allowed into the parliament. Saleh also formed dubious business alliances with tribal leaders. Together,this grouping was in a position to pressure the south and they did. Since the unification,the oil-rich south has become poorer and the north richer.

The Arab Spring,however,has changed the dynamics. Saleh’s policy of playing one tribe against the other has backfired. His alliances have unravelled and key tribesmen,like the Ahmar clan,have withdrawn their support. Their militias now battle the government in the capital. Four months ago,Saleh’s presidential palace was attacked and many attribute this to affiliates of the Ahmar confederation which commands large militias.

Yemen is now a land where the power centre has virtually collapsed. A way out of this could be the power-transition initiative by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Under this,there is the possibility for the emergence of new Yemen. For,a key component of the deal is fair elections — the Yemenis haven’t had this since the unification. But Saleh is buying time. He has gone back and forth on the deal,first agreeing to sign and then backing off.

This is a dangerous situation — in the veritable power vacuum,the country is on the edge. The AQAP franchise has grown further in southern Yemen. As the alliances that once held the country together unravel at an alarming pace,the north and south stand divided again.

Now it resembles the Yemen of the 1980s when warlords commanded control. Territories are now claimed by tribes. The country threatens to fall back into its civil war days. In the chaos there is one clear victor: al-Qaeda. The outfit continues to grow,away from the gunfire that claims the lives of peaceful protesters calling for change in Yemen’s Change Square.