Dubai: For the third straight day yesterday, armed confrontations continued between Yemeni government troops and tribesmen supporting prominent tribal leader Shaikh Sadiq Al Ahmar.
At least 48 people were killed from both sides in the three-day fighting in the capital's Hassaba district.
"[With] the lack of a solution in the political horizon, it seems that President Saleh has started to play the tribal card," said Mohammad Zaheri, political science professor at Sana'a University. He was referring to the deadlocked mediation efforts to end the crisis triggered by protests to topple President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
On Sunday, Saleh was expected to a sign a Gulf-brokered deal to end a three-month crisis to step down in 30 days.
Shortly afterwards, the Gulf States announced suspension of their mediation, and the Yemeni government warned of more violence in the country, blaming it on the opposition parties and extremists groups.
Danger
In an interview with Gulf News, Zaheri said the Yemeni president is attempting "to transform the peaceful revolution to what can be called an armed revolution". However, the dangerous thing is "to drag the tribal system into this armed conflict."
Both government forces and Shaikh Sadiq Al Ahmar, the head of Hashid, Yemen's largest tribe, on Monday traded accusations over who instigated the fighting.
On Tuesday, a missile hit Al Ahmar's home, killing and injuring several people, including some tribal leaders mediating between the two. "This is not an attack on Al Ahmar and his family only, but on all the tribes in Yemen," said Faisal Mana'a, a leader of the Bakeel, another powerful tribe.
"We will not remain silent. We are warning the regime if it doesn't withdraw its troops, we will be launching [in] a comprehensive and fierce war with them."
A statement from Saleh's office yesterday called on both sides to lay down their arms and asked the tribesmen to withdraw from government buildings they seized.
Al Ahmar has announced last March his support for the Yemeni protests and "youth revolution" calling for Saleh's departure. That position, according to analysts, was a big blow to the Yemeni president of 32-years, who is also from the tribe of Hashid. Yemen's tribes are considered essential for any government to survive.
Harsh blow
"The defection of Shaikh Al Ahmar was a very harsh blow because any ruler in Yemen survives only though tribal support," said Faris Al Saqqaf, a political analyst at the independent Future Research Center in Yemen's capital, Sana'a. "Saleh is slapping Al Ahmar in the face just as Al Ahmar slapped him in the face and he wants revenge."
In a country where the tribal system is well established, influential and deeply rooted, the outcome of any conflict between government forces and tribal leaders' loyalists is obvious. "The outcome will be in favour of the tribes," said Zaheri. "The military institution," he said, "is divided. Most of it has joined the revolution."
Soldier-politician
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has ruled through more than three decades of Middle East turmoil, has rejected a Gulf-sponsored transition plan in a bid to maintain his hold on power.
Saleh has outlived Cold War divisions, civil war and an Al Qaida insurgency but is struggling to remain in office in the face of popular protests inspired by revolts in Tunisia and Egypt that have rocked Yemen since January.
The long-time strongman on Sunday refused to sign a Gulf Cooperation Council-sponsored transition deal that would have seen him leave office in 30 days, instead demanding that the opposition sign the deal in his presence.
Saleh onn Wednesday said the deal remained on the table: “I am ready to sign within a national dialogue and a clear mechanism. If the mechanism is sound, we will sign the transition of power deal and we will give up power.”
Here are some facts about Saleh:
- Saleh, 68, is a former army officer who took power in former North Yemen in 1978 after ex-President Ahmad Al Ghashmi was killed in a bomb attack. Saleh presided over the merger in 1990 of north and south Yemen into a single country.
- Born in 1942 into a tribe living near Sana’a, Saleh received limited education before taking up a military career, beginning as a non-commissioned officer.
- His first break came when Al Ghashmi appointed him military governor of Taiz, North Yemen’s second city.
- Saleh, from the Zaidi sect, crushed an attempt to overthrow him only months after he took power in North Yemen, and then put down a brief secessionist struggle in 1994.
- Although the south has always seen simmering discontent, violence has been growing in recent months, from separatist ambushes to clashes with security forces. Saleh is also trying to cement a shaky truce struck with northern Shiite rebels.
- Saleh is seen as a key US ally in fighting Al Qaida. WikiLeaks cables showed in December that Saleh had secretly offered US forces an open door to launch attacks against Al Qaida targets in his country.
- Seen as a hard-headed pragmatist, he has tried to attract foreign investors to the small oil-producing nation while battling bids by fundamentalists to turn the country into an Islamic state and confronting frequent kidnappings of foreigners by disgruntled tribesmen.
- In a pledge to reform the economy, Saleh promised to increase salaries for civil servants and military personnel by around $47 (Dh172) a month in a country where nearly half the population lives on $2 (Dh7.35) a day or less.
Liberal tribe figure
Shaikh Sadiq Al Ahmar comes across as someone not limited by the “traditional” education of tribal leaders, or shaikhs.
Those who have dealt with him vouch that Shaikh Sadeq combines the virtues of higher education from the west and the needed sharpness and experience of handling tribal issues at home.
Announcing his support to the protesters calling for a regime change in Yemen, he said: “I announce in the name of all the members of my tribe that I am joining the revolution.” He also called on Saleh “to exempt Yemen from the bloodshed and make a quiet exit”.
In 2008, Shaikh Sadeq inherited from his father, who was also a veteran Yemeni politician, the title of ‘The Shaikh of all Shaikhs of Hashid’.
Hashid boasts the biggest number of Yemeni tribes.
“He is an open-minded person with a political vision,” commented one Yemeni political analyst.
- Shaikh Sadeq was born on October 5, 1956 in Khamer city in Omran province, near the Yemeni capital Sana’a. He received his education in Yemen and Egypt.
- Shaikh Sadeq is the oldest of the 10 sons of Shaikh Abdullah Al Ahmar.
- After obtaining his high school diploma from Egypt in 1975, he went back to Yemen and started honing his tribal leadership skills by observing his father at close quarters.
- In 1982, he travelled to the US and returned five years later with a pilot’s certificate entitling him to fly small passenger planes, according to his website.
- Sadeq won a seat in the consultative council in 1988 and, in 1990, he was among those who voted for the unification of the two parts of Yemen.
- In elections held in 1993 and 1997, Shaikh Sadeq won parliamentary seats.
- As protests broke out this year, he pledged his support for the youth movement demanding a regime change in Yemen.
— With inputs from agencies
