A good report on Yemen’s democratic development: “The level of consolidation of democracy has not changed significantly since the second half of the 1990s. ”
A. Executive summary
During the period under review, the Republic of Yemen continued to undergo a structural adjustment program while democratic standards, achieved in the early 1990s and lost in 1994, were not regained.
Fundamental structural flaws have proved difficult to correct. These flaws include tribal challenges to the state’s monopoly on the use of force; legal pluralism that weakens the entire legal system; patronage and corruption; low qualification of the labor force; military and security forces whose character is not transparent; and a weak infrastructure.
However, in comparison with many neighboring states, the transformation process as a whole has brought a remarkable undercurrent of democratic attitudes to the surface in Yemen. These have come forward even though external constraints, such as solidarity with the United States in the war on terrorism, and internal uncertainties, such as dependence on declining oil income, increasing poverty, and tribal and family interests, continue to loom large as obstacles. In view of Yemen’s extraordinary (though declining) population growth and inescapable domestic and international pressures, the future of the transformation process remains uncertain.
B. History and characteristics of transformation
In the late 1980s signs of political liberalization became apparent in the Yemen Arab Republic (YAR, North Yemen) and the People’s Democratic Republic (PDRY, South Yemen). The Yemeni Socialist Party (YSP), which ruled the PDRY, lost its most generous sponsor and it was literally bankrupted after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, the YAR’s nationalist leadership, organized in the People’s General Congress (PGC), was faced with a growing Islamist movement and it was in need of a more secular-oriented ally. Thus, the leadership of YAR and PDRY created the Republic of Yemen in 1990 out of two fundamentally different social and economic orders. The YAR had a liberal economic system governed by a conservative and autocratic, though generally weak, presidential system. Influential independent tribes in the north and northeast of the YAR kept a certain degree of autonomy. By contrast, the PDRY was a socialist country whose leaders had destroyed much of the tribal structure and espoused the principles of a centralized and planned economy. However, both systems were of a rather corporate character, which facilitated the unification process.
The leadership of the two combined states tried to secure survival via political pluralism. Thus, the first years of the Republic of Yemen were characterized by a multi-party system, hitherto unprecedented press freedom, a referendum on the constitution in 1991 and parliamentary elections in 1993. These elections abolished the PGC-YSP power sharing formula and resulted in a coalition of three parties: the PGC, the YSP and the newly formed conservative-Islamist Yemeni Congregation for Reform (YCR), led by Yemen’s most influential tribal figure.
However, privatization of the former PDRY state-owned companies, return of confiscated land, unification of public companies (e.g. airlines), and unification of the legal system was slow. The second Gulf war and Yemen’s rejection of international troops to liberate Kuwait led the latter to expel nearly a million Yemeni migrant workers. Tourism suffered from frequent kidnappings after 1992, and inflation and corruption became uncontrollable. On top of this, the exploitation of recently discovered oil reserves, especially on the territory of the former PDRY, aggravated conflicts over distribution rights between the two former ruling elites.
One year after the first parliamentary election, in spring 1994, the two former state leaderships went to war with each other. Although the southern leadership apparently received money and arms from Saudi Arabia, it was the northern leadership, which employed its own military and won support from segments of the former PDRY army and from militias made up of tribesmen and militant Islamists that emerged victorious. In July 1994, the southerners who had led the war of separation from the north left for exile in the Gulf States.
The 1994 disaster has had lasting repercussions, and the victorious leadership of the former YAR was left with the conviction that political pluralism could result in separatism. The constitution was amended immediately after the war and the Presidential Council was abolished. Instead, the president (elected by parliament in 1994) was to be directly elected and the Shariah was made the sole source of legislation, as had been the case in the YAR before unification. Press freedom was restricted, many political organizations and parties lost their (YSP) funding, and critical voices were labeled as separatists and silenced by the regime.
Mounting debts forced the leadership to accept a structural adjustment program, which started in 1995 and whose results are debatable. Yemen’s very weakly developed economy remains extremely dependent on the oil sector and has attained only a modest level of stability since structural adjustment measures were implemented.
The Yemeni government seemed to return to its path of political liberalization with parliamentary elections in 1997. The YSP boycotted these elections because its assets had been confiscated after the 1994 war and had not been returned, thus rendering any campaigning impossible. The PGC won an absolute majority and the YCR, coalition member since 1993, became the most important opposition party. When direct presidential elections were due in 1999, candidates for president had to be nominated by parliament, but because the YSP had boycotted the 1997 parliamentary elections, it could not nominate its candidate. The YCR, on the other hand, supported President Ali Abdallah Salih’s (PGC) candidature. His ruling party had to name a second candidate from its own ranks, but President Ali Abdallah Salih won 96.2% of the vote.
A second amendment to the constitution in 2001, accepted by referendum, not only extended the term of the president from five to seven years and the term of the parliament from four to five years, it also weakened the position of the parliament (majlis an-nuwwab) vis-à-vis the executive in several ways. A consultative council (al-majlis ash-shura), appointed by the president and introduced as a consultative body (al-majlis al-istishari) to the executive according to the amendments of 1994, took over some legislative functions, and the president’s options to dissolve parliament were increased.
Decentralization, a promise going back to the early 1990s, was brought forward, and together with the constitutional referendum, local councils were elected for the first time in 2001. The PGC dominated the local elections and when parliamentary elections were held for the third time in 2001, the PGC gained a two-thirds majority.
C. Assessment
1. Democracy
The malfunctioning of the political system reached its preliminary peak with the presidential elections in 1999. The method of trial and error that characterized the early 1990s seems to have resulted only in a modernized version of the political system of the YAR. There are, however, a number of major differences. Party pluralism and decentralization have become generally accepted principles, a number of relatively critical newspapers have been established and are distributed in print and online, literacy is on the rise, national television stations have to compete with satellite stations like al-Jazeera, and a number of civil society organizations have taken root. Neighboring countries, having embarked on the path of political and economic liberalization themselves, have less reason to interfere in Yemen’s domestic affairs.
1.1. Stateness
Despite some alarming press reports after 9/11, the state’s monopoly on the use of force is established in principle in central parts of the country, though the lack and/or weakness of state institutions leads many citizens to stick to traditional methods of conflict resolution. However, there are some large but sparsely populated areas where tribal forces continue to resist what they perceive as the state’s encroachment on their autonomy, especially when the state is represented by security forces rather than any kind of services.
Moreover, the population in most rural areas remains armed, mainly for status reasons, but clashes between tribesmen or between tribesmen and security forces occasionally occur. Serious recent problems have occurred between tribal and security forces in the northern governorate of Sa’da since summer 2004. Husain Badr ad-Din al-Huthi, a rebellious Zaidi (a moderate Shi’a sect that is predominant in northern Yemen) sayyid (a descendant of the prophet’s family who would have been qualified to become Imam or ruler of North Yemen before the revolution in 1962) challenged the government for its policy toward the United States. The government’s brutal reaction drew local tribes into the conflict because the Zaidi sayyids are traditionally protected by the tribes in whose territory they settle. Hundreds were killed in clashes that kept erupting in early 2005 despite al-Huthi’s death in autumn 2004.
There is fundamental agreement about which people qualify as citizens of the state. All citizens have the same civil rights. The majority fundamentally acknowledges the constitution that was approved by referendum in 1991. The constitution has been amended twice thereafter, and since 1994 has made the Shariah the sole source of legislation which could affect women and the tiny Jewish minority of roughly 1,000 members. While the only public office that is officially reserved to a male Muslim is the presidential office, a Jewish candidate was not accepted by the Supreme Elections Committee in 2003. Women have been elected to parliament (two in 1993, two in 1997 and one in 2003), there are female ambassadors, and a woman was appointed Human Rights Minister in 2003. Nevertheless, women are disadvantaged by the personal status law, and female judges, a normal phenomenon in the former PDRY, are de facto restricted to juvenile courts. Traditional roles, especially in the former YAR, change only at a very slow pace.
The state functions as a secular order with modern institutions. However, for approximately a thousand years all ruling elites in the northwestern (and sometimes in the southeastern) part of the country have used Islam to varying degrees as a basis of legitimacy and thus integrated, in one form or another, religious dogmas into the legal and political sphere. Even though the Zaidi Imamate was replaced by the Yemen Arab Republic in 1962, the Shariah has officially remained the sole source of legislation to date (except between 1990 and 1994). Unlike in other Arab countries, however, religious institutions do not interfere in politics.
The state infrastructure and its powers are beginning to extend beyond maintaining law and order, but there is a physical lack of courts, police stations and appropriately trained state employees, particularly in rural areas. Decentralization measures (including local elections in 2001) have been hampered by lack of financial and human resources.
1.2. Political participation
Yemen has had a multi-party system since 1990, and general elections are held at local, parliamentary and presidential levels and accepted in principle as the means of filling leadership positions. Elections are supervised by a formally independent committee, the Supreme Committee for Elections and Referenda, whose members are suggested by parliament and appointed by the president. Domestic and foreign observers can work freely. However, the PGC dominates the Supreme Elections Committee, and there are claims of unequal opportunities for campaigning and irregularities during registration and on Election Day.
The first direct Presidential elections in 1999 were de facto uncompetitive because the YCR supported PGC candidate President Ali Abdallah Salih and the YSP could not nominate their candidate due to their boycott of the 1997 parliamentary elections. Since 2003, five parties, including the YSP, have been represented in the Yemeni parliament, but the PGC holds a two-thirds majority. The YCR is the only opposition party to be reckoned with, but its leadership tends to enter into informal agreements with the ruling PGC.
Elected rulers have the power to govern in important matters, but they simultaneously represent particular interest groups: the president represents the military and the speaker of parliament represents traditional rural elites and business interests. The last amendment of the constitution further strengthened the executive vis-à-vis the legislature. While these amendments were approved by referendum, it can be assumed that the majority of voters were unaware of the contents of the amendments, which were not widely published.
Party pluralism has been anchored in the constitution since 1991. NGOs are allowed to function within the limits of the NGO law (Law Number 1 of 2001) and its by-law of May 2004. However, corporatism prevails and the government supports the fundraising of “loyal” NGOs. While the NGO law grants a relatively large degree of freedom to NGOs, including foreign finance, its by-law makes sure that foreign funding remains under control and internal elections are observed by representatives of the ministries. As a rule, there are no prohibitions on parties or social organizations as long as they are not perceived as threatening national unity. NGOs are concentrated in urban areas, mainly Sanaa, Ta’izz and Aden. In general, the third sector is weak. However, opposition parties and NGOs (including academic research centers) keep pushing for human rights, clean elections and better governance, and put much effort into educating the younger generations on citizens’ rights.
The constitution guarantees all citizens freedom of opinion and expression in all forms. It also guarantees freedom of the press, publication and mass media. However, Article 103 of the law on press and publications (Law Number 25 of 1990) sets a number of limits on press freedom. Journalists who are not protected by influential political actors are frequently arrested, especially when they criticize the president and his family, or are seen as stirring up public unrest or threatening national unity. The Yemeni Journalists Syndicate recently began coordinating a debate about improvement of the press law.
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