In a little less than a month, on June 18, Yemen’s National Dialogue Conference will be half way over. This reconciliatory meeting of over 500 representatives from all over Yemen is meant to draw a road map for Yemen’s future including the drafting of a new constitution and laying the groundwork for national elections in early 2014.
On the day of the conference’s inauguration on March 18, there was hardly a television channel or radio station in Sana’a that wasn’t tuned into the broadcasting of President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi and the rest of the representatives’ opening speeches.
Although the ongoing NDC sessions continue to be televised on a daily basis, the fervor and enthusiasm to tune in has waned, locals say.
Um Hitham, a 30-year-old who lives in Sana’a, is one such resident.
“I was optimistic and eagerly awaited the opening session because the NDC will determine our future and the future of the generations to come,” she said. “However, the disputes, objections and withdrawals that happened during the first session made me pessimistic and reluctant to watch the rest of it.”
Um Hitham’s opinion is shared by many.
They say they feel disconnected from the nine major issues being tackled at the conference including talks about unity, a lack of government control over an armed group of Houthi rebels in the country’s North, state construction and questions of the nation’s security.
One source of complaint is a lack of confidence in the representatives to tackle such concerns. Khalid Mohammed, a 34-year-old who lives in Sana’a, said the dialogue is lacking committed individuals.
“I occasionally watch them, but I feel disappointed because the hall is almost vacant. So, who is going to determine our future?” he asked.
According to conference officials the daily meetings have an average attendance rate of 87 percent. Currently there are 556 members out of the 565 seats that were originally stipulated by the conference’s Preparatory Committee. The conference has for the most part maintained its original conditions of the breakdown of seats: 50 percent Southerners, 30 percent women and 20 percent youth. Currently 52 percent of representatives are from the South, women make up 28.5 percent and youth are at 15 percent.
Some have praised the positive byproducts of the ongoing debates held at the Movenpick Hotel in Sana’a. Since the conference began, checkpoints have been erected all over the city. There is more stability and a sense of pride in the state, said university student Mohammed Nasser, but he is not completely convinced.
“This is not enough to make us believe the dialogue will succeed and safety and security will be [completely] restored. Perhaps the country’s [unstable] situation will be improved once the dialogue is over.”
Nasser says he is no longer interested in the daily details of the conference but he does occasionally read articles about it in newspapers and on websites.
“We await the outcomes,” he said.
The NDC formed a media committee to keep people abreast to the conference’s latest developments via an information center. The committee is also currently carrying out a plan to mobilize community participation.
Ahmed Sinan, a political analyst who closely follows the NDC, said the conference’s nine working groups will be making field visits May 12 to the 17 in governorates nationwide in order to meet people, engage them in the conference’s developments and receive feedback.
Sinan admits people may have pessimistic views of the conference but he attributes this to past dialogue-esque meetings that were considered failures.
Political parties in Yemen have tried more than once to reach a consensus about power-sharing via mediations. After North and South Yemen unified in 1990 then President Ali Abdullah Saleh and former Southern President Ali Salem Al-Biedh struggled for control. Despite negotiations brokered by King Hussein Bin Talal, the Jordanian king at the time, disagreements between the two leader cumulated in the 1994 Civil War, which lasted a few short months and ended in a northern victory.
Another more recent example of failed negotiations happened in 2009 when the ruling General People’s Congress Party’s opposition, the Joint Meeting Parties, formed a Preparatory Committee for a dialogue conference to solve what they said was a deteriorating situation in Yemen. Yemen’s current Prime Minister Mohammed Salem Basundwah, an independent, came up with a National Salvation Plan for Yemen. The dialogue never materialized into anything as critics said it was not inclusive (the GPC was not invited) nor practical as it required more than 2,000 people to agree on debated issues.
“Past dialogues were only for show,” Sina said. “There was never a comprehensive dialogue like what is happening today.”
Sinan is optimistic about the potential effect of the dialogue on the country.
“This dialogue gives a space for community participation and the participation of the experts,” he said, adding that their number one goal is to keep Yemenis feeling like they are a part of the dialogue.
Yaseen Saeed Noman, deputy chair of the NDC, secretary general of the Yemeni Socialist Party and former prime minister of Yemen, said negative media coverage is contributing to people’s disillusionment with the conference.
He said coverage focuses on the disputes happening in the daily sessions instead of the positive steps being made.
“People are looking forward,” Noman said.
Yemen’s current leader President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi has on several public appearances continued to stress his confidence in the nation’s state-building process. At the Arab Leaders Summit in Doha in March, Hadi delivered a speech reassuring high-level international officials of his country’s dialogue.
“The world will be surprised with a unique, new model of reforms and sought after change that will be achieved through dialogue,” the president said.
“Dialogue will help build a modern civil state in which all Yemenis will enjoy freedom, justice and equal citizenship.”
by: Ryam al-Qadi
