A voice from Hamadan… a call to conscience before the tribe

Yemen

Yamanat

Abdul Wahab Qatran

During an anxiety-ridden and question-laden Yemeni retreat, I traveled this afternoon with a number of Hamadan men to the home of the Hashid Sheikh of Sheikhs, Sheikh Himyar bin Abdullah bin Hussein Al-Ahmar, at Al-Hasaba in Sana’a, not out of tribal alignment or social ostentation, but rather as a means of seeking help when the paths are narrow and asking for help when all the official methods have been exhausted in vain.

We started our journey from the gates of the state, not from the gates of the tribe.

We have knocked on every door to say that the Constitution and the law are meant to be a refuge for the oppressed and a refuge for the oppressed citizens.

About three months ago, we filed complaints, petitions, grievances and legal requests to the Sanaa Attorney General, the Presidency of the Republic, the Prime Minister, the Ministry of Interior and the Inspector General. All this in order to free the kidnapped members of our brothers, the sons of Hamdan, who were taken from their homes without legitimate or legal justification, without arrest warrant or legal procedure, and without referral to the competent justice within the legal period of 24 hours.

Detainees were denied their most basic constitutional rights:

Find out about the charge, contact their families, hire an attorney, or have an attorney present during the investigation.

These rights are not a favor from anyone, but rather clear texts on which there is no difference in law, custom or human values.

After that, we went to see some Sheikhs of Hamadan, including Sheikh Yahya Ali Ayed, who in turn communicated with the Governor of Sanaa Governorate, Brother Abdul Basit Al-Hadi. The man expressed his willingness to guarantee and demanded the release of Hamdan’s sons, but the response was…silence.

Nothing is heavier on the human heart than silence when it comes to the fate of brothers and sons who have been forcibly disappeared for fifty days, about whom we know nothing: are they alive or in danger?

No contact, no visit, not even information to reassure a mother about her child or a brother about his brother.

Only then…

While all institutional channels were closed to us and we found no answer, we went this afternoon to Sheikh Himyar al-Ahmar, not in his capacity as a political symbol, but in his capacity as leader of the Hashid tribe, and Hamedan, one of the tribes of the Hashid al-Shabab.

And Al-Ahmar is the sheikh of his sheikhs.

He is one of the wise men to whom people traditionally turn in such cases when the doors are closed. We went to him for good effort, nothing more.

What encouraged us to visit Sheikh Himyar is that we followed what was published almost twenty days ago, more precisely last November 19, about a meeting held at his home in Sanaa, which brought together a number of sheikhs from the Hashid and Bakil tribes and a number of sheikhs and notables from Yemen, to discuss the issue of detainees, led by Professor Hammoud Al-Awdi and Eng. Abdul Rahman Al-Alfi. This meeting resulted in a statement calling on authorities in Sanaa to quickly release them and all detainees with opinions.

Just two days after this meeting and the resulting appeals and efforts, Al-Awdi and Al-Alfi were released after half a month of detention.

This experience has confirmed to us that the voice of wisdom and calm efforts can bear fruit and that dealing with such matters in a responsible spirit reduces much suffering and misunderstanding. That is why today we intend to seek the same role and we hope that the efforts will bear fruit as they have before.

We explained to him the forced disappearance of our brothers from Hamdan, led by my brother Arif Muhammad Qatran and his son Abdul Salam, kidnapped since September 21 in the context of the intention to celebrate the sixty-third anniversary of the September 26 Revolution.

That’s why hundreds of them were arrested, and then the last group of them was released about a month ago…

Except Hamdan’s sons who, instead of being released, were victims of enforced disappearance. This is not consistent with any legal approach, national traditions or state values, no matter how different the circumstances.

We assured Sheikh Himyar that our goal is not escalation, alignment or political embarrassment. Our goal is clear and simple:

Reassure our brothers that they will return home as others who were arrested on the same day and under the same circumstances have returned.

The meeting took place calmly and responsibly, aiming to find a solution that would preserve the dignity of everyone and restore the normal situation, without tensions or interpretations.

We did not go to argue with anyone, nor to challenge an authority, but rather to demand the guarantee of a human and legal right, and to express a concern which was compounded by the prolonged absence and interruption of information.

We are convinced that the efforts made will not be in vain, that the safety of people is not an area of ​​compromise and that the voice of wisdom will remain louder than any tension or misunderstanding. We hope that this effort will lead to the return of the missing to their families and that the facts will be clear as quickly as possible, in order to close a painful page that could not have continued.

Today’s Yemen needs calm, not escalation, wisdom, not stubbornness, and preservation of the dignity of its people, without leaving them in the circle of absence.

We are not asking for more than one right, and we only want to be reassured and quickly release our detainees who are victims of forced disappearance.

God is the Helper.

Yemen