A reading of the paradox of the Southern Council and the Houthi movement in the north
Yemen
Yamanat
Fahmi Mohammed
Without the slightest doubt, the Southern Transitional Council is fully aware that the decision to declare the secession of the South and restore its statehood is not only a political step that relies on military control in the southern governorates alone, but rather a very complex fateful strategic decision, linked to the availability of mature objective conditions at the internal, regional and international levels. Controlling territory is not enough. Rather, there must be a political, economic, social and even service will to guarantee the capacity of the new entity to survive and bear the consequences of national sovereignty and the authority of the state in power from day one. With the announcement of the creation of the Southern State, the Transitional Council will move from a political faction with a cause to a state authority assuming full responsibility towards citizens. I am talking about security, stability and development.
For example, but not limited to, if the Transitional Council, despite its effective control over most of the south, continues to demand that the legitimate Yemeni government fulfill its service and financial obligations to citizens, starting with services and ending with the disbursement of salaries, this means, in today’s political sense, that the Southern Transitional Council is governing without taking full responsibility, leaving its legal and real burden on the shoulders of the legitimate authority. The latter itself is unable to fulfill these commitments without regional and international support, led by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which remains publicly committed to the unity of Yemen and the support of the legitimate government.
At the international level, the Southern Transitional Council has failed to achieve a breakthrough capable of changing the conviction of the great powers, or even regional ones, on the question of the division of Yemen into two states. The UAE alone supports the Transitional Council on the issue of restoring the southern state, but it remains cautious and is not ready to translate into official political discourse in favor of secession in Yemen. All of this data paints a clear picture for transition leaders: declaring the creation of a Southern state, based on current circumstances, remains at the highest level of danger and the lowest level of wisdom.
Added to this is the danger of the regional and international scene that has so far been affected by the Houthi escalation in the Red Sea, a scene that has transformed the Houthi movement into a direct and continuous threat to regional and international interests.
In this context, dividing Yemen will mean, from the perspective of these countries, a serious reduction in the political, military and human space available in Yemen to confront the Houthis internally, and this will come at the expense of the strength of Yemeni legitimacy. In other words, the battle for Yemeni legitimacy in the face of the Houthi movement’s coup will shift from the space of the Republic of Yemen to a limited political space in the north, while the Houthis control the vast majority of its population and geography, if we exclude the areas subject to legitimacy in Taiz, Hodeidah, Marib and Al-Jawf, which practically means consolidating the control of this militia and forming a regional sectarian state in the northern Yemen, but its political decision is in Tehran. On this basis, the Houthis themselves are eagerly awaiting the announcement of a recognized southern state, so that they can free themselves from the great weight of Yemen and also establish their secession in a manner consistent with their sectarian regional political authority.
The question that arises on this basis is: why is the STC embarking on a military escalation to completely control the southern governorates and engaging in complex regional battles, if it realizes that declaring a southern state is not possible at present?
The truth is that the STC, aware of all these complications, will not announce its disengagement now, even with the pressure from the rue du Sud which supports it to announce its disengagement. But on the other hand, with its political and military advance, it creates new facts on the ground. The goal is to establish total control and create the political, military, social and economic conditions that will pave the way for declaring the creation of the Southern State at the right time, not tomorrow.
It can maneuver and negotiate regarding the timing of the announcement, in exchange for the preservation of its political and military gains, particularly in Hadhramaut and Al-Mahra. What matters to him now is total control of the south within two political and military limits: the first: getting rid of any military presence from the north, not because these forces belong to the Muslim Brotherhood or infiltrated by Houthi militias, but because they are of northern affiliation, and the second: working to weaken the legitimate Yemeni government. These two factors are capable of effectively creating the reality of the “Southern State” in the Southern governorates, even before it is officially announced.
It is true that the problem of time remains crucial in this equation, especially if time is linked to the occurrence of political changes in the north. From the point of view of the Transition Council, the time factor is a double-edged sword. It is now necessary to establish total control over the south, but in exchange he wants the clock and even events to freeze in the north. The issue of liberating the capital, Sanaa, and overthrowing the Houthis is not among the transition’s real priorities, even though it raises such slogans and addresses inside and outside that it is time to move towards Sanaa.
The Transitional Council realizes in its political calculations (and this is information and not political analysis) that the liberation of Sanaa at this time will not be in its interest linked to the creation of the Southern State. Because the liberation of Sanaa will restore the effective and strong authority of the legitimate Yemeni government, with its army, its people and the population density that supports it in the north and in the south. In other words, Yemeni legitimacy will shift from an authority resisting the Houthi movement to a ruling state in Sanaa under the aegis of the Republic of Yemen.
The international community will then treat Sana’a as a legitimate, leading and effective state on the ground, and its relations with the de facto authority of Yemen will disappear, and the process of secession or declaration of the creation of the southern state will be greatly complicated. Even with the recognition of the right to self-determination, the referendum results desired by the transition party may not be guaranteed given political differences in the south, which would strengthen the option of a federal state of Yemen in the event of the removal of the Houthi movement’s authority in northern Yemen.
It is true that the Transitional Council, in any case, will remain the political bearer of the southern question, and on this basis, since its political authority and its military presence are not now the subject of popular consensus throughout the south, the freezing of the political clock in Sanaa and the maintenance of the Houthi movement in power in the north of Yemen without a real establishment will make the transitional council the best option for all southerners, or for the majority of them. The north under the project of the Houthi movement and under its political authority is the north which is absolutely rejected according to all the options of the south, and this is the real rupture with the future of Yemeni unity, not only according to the calculations of the transition, but also according to the calculations of the Houthi movement itself, whose political calculations overlap with the aspirations of the transition. This does not mean that there is mutual political harmony between the Southern Transitional Council and the Houthi movement in the north, but rather that the calculations of political interests have placed this convergence in the visions of the two enemies in reality.
The Houthi movement, based on this strange paradox, sees, like the STC, that its interest lies in the fact that Yemeni legitimacy remains a weak and divided authority at the same time, and that its political authority does not transform into a ruling state in the south and in the liberated areas in the north. On the contrary, the interest of the Houthi movement lies in transforming the STC into a recognized state in the south. Then the movement will embark on a military war, not against the transition movement inside Yemen, but against Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates: a new negotiated war aimed at recognizing its political authority over what it controls in the north, in exchange for the abandonment of legitimacy and the return of the south to its independent state, which ensures the survival of Houthi authority over the north, and this is the best option for the Houthi movement given the impossibility of its political and military capacity to swallow a unified Yemen and govern the Yemeni people of the north. and to the south.
In conclusion: The near future seems locked in a complex equation of waiting and anticipation. The Transitional Council, with its diligent measures to impose effective overall control, is in fact striving to embody a “deep state” in southern Yemen that possesses all elements of control except recognition and official form. This cumulative project, depending on the results of its progress, aims to ultimately make the declaration of the State of the South a simple stamp, not on paper, but on an existing reality in the southern governorates.
Therefore, the conflict in Yemen today is no longer just a war between legitimacy and coup, but has transformed into a hidden race in time between two separatist projects: a regional south and a sectarian north, each seeking to reinforce the reality of Yemen’s current division and gain its political recognition from the world, while the forces supporting unity are trying, even from the point of view of their interests, to preserve the structure of Yemeni legitimacy led by Dr. Rashad Al-Alami, even in its weakest form. The outcome of this race will be determined not only by the strength of arms on the ground, but also by the capacity of each party to transform its facts on the ground into a permanent political and international reality, and by its capacity to bear the enormous burdens which will follow any official announcement at the appropriate time.
Yemen