BEIRUT – Only bold reforms can calm Yemen’s perfect storm of economic and political woes, the deputy finance minister said in Sanaa, where angry street protests have erupted against President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
“People do have fair grievances everywhere in Yemen, but unfortunately they are being used by politicians from both sides,” Jalal Yaqoub told Reuters in a telephone interview on Thursday. “The government should listen to the people and enact substantial reforms that give the government credibility that it will do the right thing for the people, not for the political leaders. That starts by improving government administration.”
At least 10,000 protesters gathered at Sanaa University and about 6,000 elsewhere in the capital in peaceful demonstrations organised by Yemen’s opposition coalition, witnesses said. It was the largest of a wave of anti-government protests in Yemen inspired partly by unrest in Tunisia, where the president was toppled this month, Egypt and other Arab countries.
Saleh has tried to calm discontent, asking Yemenis in a speech on Sunday to be patient and forgive any mistakes he had made. Last week he proposed constitutional amendments including presidential term limits with two terms of five or seven years. This week he also promised to raise the salaries of civil servants and military personnel by at least $47 a month.
Yaqoub said debate over constitutional amendments and voting systems meant less to ordinary Yemenis than jobs, food, education and services such as water and electricity. “We have had a parliamentary majority for the last seven years and we should have used it to drive development forward. We have the plans. We seriously lack implementation,” he said.
Saleh, a US ally in combating a resurgent Yemeni arm of al Qaeda, has ruled for nearly 33 years. He faces a separatist revolt in the south, home to most of Yemen’s oil and gas sites. A shaky truce with rebels in the north has held since February. “I believe that President Saleh remains the only one who can maintain the stability of this country,” Yaqoub said.
Yemen, next door to the world’s top oil exporter Saudi Arabia, is struggling with soaring unemployment and dwindling oil and water reserves. Almost half its 23 million people live on $2 a day or less, and a third suffer from chronic hunger. “The challenges facing Yemen are compounding, whether it is water, oil, foreign reserves, unemployment, inflation.
It’s like the perfect storm,” said Yaqoub, one of several reform-minded technocrats in the government. “Change must come from within.” Lack of administrative capacity was a major impediment to reform, he said, noting that 90 percent of the $4.7 billion pledged by foreign donors in 2006 had not yet been disbursed.
