Sana’a: The party of Yemen’s former president, Ali Abdullah Saleh has filed a complaint to the UN Secretary General against his special envoy Jamal Bin Omar, accusing him of being “biased”. The General People Congress(GPC), said that the UN envoy has abandoned his role as a mediator and threw in his lots with the Joint Meeting Parties(JMP), an umbrella term for parties that opposed Saleh’s regime.

In its letter, the party said that Bin Omar provoked Saleh’s supporters when he called the former president to leave his position as the head of the party and also described Saleh’s regime as a “corrupt and unjust”.

Jamal Bin Omar was appointed as a special envoy of the UN Secretary General to Yemen to monitor implementation of a GCC-brokered that ended the rule of the former president. “For over a month, he [Bin Omar] has been slandering the General People’s Congress affirming his lack of neutrality,” according to a statement posted on the party’s website. However, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has ignored the accusation and instead urged all parties in Yemen to work with Bin Omar in the transition process. Bin Omar also irritated Saleh’s supporters when he said that transitional president Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi could stay in power after the end of his term in February 2014.

Saleh’s supporters responded by saying that the extension is violation to the GCC initiative. Nabil Al Soufi, a pro-Saleh journalist, says that GCC peace initiative states that a committee should be formed to interpret the deal’s terms and to determine the end of the transitional period. “Hadi and Bin Omar blocked the formation of the committee and are interpreting the terms as they see fit. I think both Hadi and Bin Omar are looking for a scapegoat for their failure as the National Dialogue has not found solutions to the country’s issues like Saada and South,” Al Soufi said.

But other journalists and analysts say that the current showdown between UN envoy and Saleh’s party is linked to the outcome of the National Dialogue. The National Dialogue is discussing a law that outlaws the former president from taking any political position in exchange for immunity. “The GPC thinks that Bin Omar is in Hadi and JMP’s pockets after he supported the extension of Hadi’s term,” Jamal Amir, the editor of the weekly Al Wasat newspaper, told Gulf News.

Commenting on the timing of party’s letter to the UN, Amer said: “The party is concerned about the ongoing transitional talks that could pass some laws that undermine the party’s position in the political arena through isolating its leader Ali Abdullah Saleh.” Jamal said that there is a power struggle between Hadi and Saleh over the leadership of the party. Despite being the president of the republic, Hadi has remains Saleh’s deputy in the party. “Abandoning political activities means quitting his position in the party which serves as a shield against attempts to prosecute him.”