Slaughtered Like a Goat in a Yemeni Police Station
This kind of anarchy results from the fact that the entire leadership structure of Yemen’s security forces and military is in the hands of the president’s relatives who operate with impunity, and so do their associates, and their associates’ associates. And so it goes until things deteriorate to the point that a college security guard can walk into a police station, shoot a prisoner in the head, and then go dancing home to threaten the dead guy’s kid.
Salal al-Rawee was slaughtered like a goat at the hands of savage tribesmen at the criminal investigation office in Ibb Oct. 13. The irony is that the perpetrators are the head of the criminal investigation office at Thamar governorate, the security officer of Thamar University and a professor at the same university accompanied with a group of armed tribesmen. Exploiting their security positions, they managed to go through with their guns all security checkpoints stationed along the way from Thamar to Ibb governorate. They went into the criminal investigations office and asked for the defendant Salah al-Rawee. They camouflaged the security men at the office and when Salah was brought from his cell, they stabbed him with their Jambias or daggers and then shot him dead. Some managed to escape and go back dancing after this great victory, while others were arrested. Not only this, the tribesmen descending from al-Hadda in Thamar invaded the city of Ibb again and destroyed the small house of al-Rawee and continued threatening to kidnap his son. They also protested to demand the release of the murderers.
The 45-year old al-Rawee bought a piece of land from the endowment office in Ibb several years ago. An influential colonel from al-Hadda tried several ways to manipulate the man to get that piece of land, but no way. Al-Rawee stuck to his right to own that piece of land. Due to lack of money to construct a house on it, he preferred to grow it. The uncontrolled colonel continued harassing the man and his family to the extent of beating of his wife, according to her speech to al-Nidaa weekly last week. He was put in jail for several months. However, he came out like a hero despite his pale appearance and frustration with a corrupt real estate system that transferred the ownership of the land to the colonel. He decided to build a small room to uphold his ownership of the land. He lived in the small room with his family. And while the government was celebrating the 44 anniversary of the 14 October Revolution marking the end of injustice, the colonel was leading a group of armed men to pound the small room of al-Rawee at night. He resisted and they fired their guns to shoot him but, to his wife’s story, they missed their target and instead shot their colonel instead. Al-Rawee informed the police and surrendered to the criminal investigations police that did not protect his life. He was given to his opponents to simply kill and then celebrate outside the police station their victory over the state, or, so to speak, celebrate killing the state and the rule of law.
The perpetrators who are supposed to be the protectors and implementers of law and order behaved like a criminal gang and their tribal sentiments were stronger than their loyalty to the state and its regulations. This shows the situation of law in our country. Nobody is ready to respect even if they are working as its actors. The murder of al-Rawee is truly heinous crime that should bring hell loose. He is the victim of the deflowered law and order, of the absence of justice and the prevalence of the jungle law where influential figures are ready to devour the poor people who have no tribal backup. Yes, the tribal system has been acting against any efforts to establish a state ruled by law and order. The parliament discussed the case and decided to set a fact-finding mission. As usual, the tribal heads have started acting to settle down accounts through tribal norms. The government, of course, bows to the tribal norms and in this way, the rights of the people get lost. Such submission to the rule of the tribe will continue to cripple any attempts to build a state of law.
The conflict between Saleh Abdu Saeed al-Ra’wi and Mohammed Nasser al-Bada, which culminated in the murder of al-Bada and the vengeance killing of al-Ra’wi in the Ibb Central Prison, began in 2003 when al-Bada began to take over a piece of land in the Ibb neighborhood of al-Gabagib, which al-Ra’wi owned.
Two years ago, al-Bada, a brigadier working in the executive bureau in the governorate, obtained a document of ownership over this land from the former manager of the endowment, Abdul-Hamid al-Ashwal. Al-Bada had hoped that this would force al-Ra’wi to revoke his claim to the land.
Al-Bada applied various pressures attempting to force al-Ra’wi to back down. In 2003, al-Ra’wi’s wife was beaten, and he was received kidnapping threats. The more pressure from al-Bada, the more insistent al-Ra’wi was in his refusal to give in. At one point, al-Bada had al-Rawi imprisoned for five months—but al-Ra’wi refused to back down.
Al-Bada built a wall around the land, but al-Ra’wi built a room without a ceiling inside the wall, according to general manager of units administration in the governorate, Ahmed al-Doghaish, who openly supports al-Ra’wi’s claim to the land.
Ambiguity surrounds the identity of al-Bada’s killer. “On the night of Sunday, October 13th, at about eleven thirty, al-Bada, along with a group of his friends, raided the land to destroy the room built by al-Ra’wi,” said al-Ra’wai’s wife. “When the raiders began dismantling the building, Saleh heard a bullet fired into the air. The raiders ran away.
“Saleh went outside to check what had happened, and while he was talking to me, one of the raiders hit him with a bar from behind. He fell down. They shot at him again but missed, killing their friend Mohammed,” she said.
The raiders thought that they had killed Saleh, and began to withdraw, but they were surprised when they heard Saleh shouting at them to rescue their friend, but they left him, Mrs. al-Ra’wi said. “Saleh soon reported the event and submitted himself to the criminal investigative unit.”
On the following day, the morning of Tuesday, October 16th, the manager of criminal investigation of Dhamar, along with a group of armed men entered the Criminal Investigation headquarters of Ibb. The group’s leader presented himself to the officer on duty, S. al-Ma’in, and asked to see al-Ra’wi. The officer asked a soldier to bring him from his cell, and a few minutes later Saleh was brought to the officer’s room.
“This is Saleh,” the soldier said. A member of the armed group immediately stabbed al-Ra’wi several times and shot him, said an anonymous witness at the Administration of Criminal Investigation.
They then attempted to escape the scene in their cars, but were stopped by an armed security car, with guns trained on the assailants. The group was imprisoned, but after 24 hours some were released.
The killing inside of the Criminal Investigation headquarters and the release of the killers provoked anger in the people of Ibb. Several bulletins were issued by social organizations, political parties, JMPs, and civil society organizations, strongly condemning the crime, denouncing the barbaric methods employed by the criminals, and criticizing the apparent indifference of the government’s security force.
The protest echoed in Parliament, where news was revealed that Abu Asba, al-Bukhaity, and other Ibb sheikhs attempted to solve the problem tribally, al-Doghaish told the Yemen Observer last Sunday.
The sheikhs of Ibb are divided: one group, headed by Sheikh Mohammed Qasim al-Ansi, supports the tribal solution; the other group of sheikhs oppose it. While they were discussing the problem at Sheikh Abdul-Aziz al-Hobaish’s house last Tuesday, it was reported that after the killing of al-Ra’wi, an armed group destroyed the room that al-Ra’wi built, moved into his house and destroyed the windows and furniture. It was suggested that they were looking for al-Ra’wi’s wife and sons.
