There is a movement among the southern elite which does not see the southern issue only as the result of administrative mistakes committed by the previous political regime in the South, or as a political issue and a matter of injustice, but believes that unity was a mistake in and of itself. They feel it was this that has hurt the interests of the South at the level of elites and people. Given the demographic, geographic and economic disparity between the South and North; the South has a smaller population than the North (a ratio of, roughly, 1:4); and is richer than the North (in comparison to the size of the population) in natural resources and land. Thus, the South will be much better off separated from the Norths overpopulation, sectarian problems, and the continuing conflicts between the social and political forces over the limited resources. Because of the fact that any democracy necessarily depends on a majority system, which in this instance would give control back to the North and abuse the Souths rights to power and wealth, a modern democratic state does not meet the aspirations of that movement. Due to the numerical majority of the North, which was apparent in the first parliamentary election after the unification of the State in April 1993; an election, which removed the Socialist Party that represented the South in that period, from authority making it a secondary party with only fifty-six out of a total of 301 seats. This, in fact, lead to the alienation of a large number of the southern elite, and then when the 1994 Summer War broke out and they demanded that former president Ali Salem al-Beidh openly declare separation. What later reinforced separatist sentiment in the South were the injustices, the policy of marginalisation and exclusion, and the looting of wealth practiced by the former regime in the South. So today we find a large segment of the southern elite and people who see separation as the perfect solution for the South. The frontrunner in the movement of the secession movement, at the level of the elites and organised labour, is the Separatist Movement led by al-Beidh who calls for immediate separation from the North. Another group among the separatist movement is represented by the peaceful movement that rejects rapid and violent separation. Their position is that that would drag the South into chaos and internal conflicts. Rather they aspire for smooth and peaceful separation through the option of a bi-regional federal state with equal shared power structures during the transition period, and the right to a referendum on self-determination after five years. This would be a similar process to the 2005 Naivasha Agreement between North and South Sudan. Their most prominent leader is the southern leader Abu Bakr al-Attas and a broad spectrum of leaders at home and abroad. There is another broad and wide southern movement in the current ruling authorities in Sanaa, as well as the extensions of the main parties in the southern provinces. It agrees with the former movement that unity in its current form does not take into account the right of the South to power and wealth, and that it has deviated from the path of participatory unity. Yet this movement believes that the massive disintegration among the southern forces and the lack of a single united force able to control the South may likely lead to the return of old regional conflicts over power which were aggravated by the events of 13 January 1984, and led to the break away from the defeated party to the North, and later to its participation alongside the northern forces in defeating the separatist forces in 1994. From the standpoint of this movement, the most appropriate option is to reform the path of unity, through resolving injustices and reforming previous imbalances that prevailed in the South, and most importantly to return to participatory unity where the South is an equal partner to the North that would not depend exclusively on a numerical majority. This would see an agreement on a special status for the South so as to match its land-population ratio, and to share northern power and wealth equally. The federalism issue and the issue around the number of regions are not priorities for this movement, as they feel that these issues do not represent the root of the problem. Rather, their priority is to reach lasting agreements that ensure the South will be an equal partner and not subordinate to the North.
Posted on: Sun, 01 Dec 2013 18:36:56 +0000
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