اخبار اليمن – وطن نيوز
اخبار اليمن اليمن الان – اخبار اليمن اليوم
W6nnews.com ==== وطن === تاريخ النشر – 2026-06-11 16:07:00
A dialogue with yesterday’s comrades in Riyadh and today’s questions: Does the solution start from Riyadh or from the will of the South? Yafa News – Dr. Abdullah Abdul Samad. This is not a dialogue that took place in one session, nor is it a reaction to a passing event. Rather, it is the summary of long and scattered discussions that took place during the past five months between me and my companions who brought us together over the years of the southern struggle, who are in Riyadh. From the days of the southern peaceful movement, through the southern resistance, until the stage of the Southern Transitional Council. Comrades with whom we shared the same dream, and together we walked a long path of suffering, sacrifices, displacement, and hope. Our visions differed today on some issues, but what brought us together yesterday is still greater than any urgent political disagreement. In those repeated dialogues, the southern issue was present, Riyadh was present, and the future of the south was the biggest question that came back every time in a different form. The dialogue: They told me: We should not be hostile to Saudi Arabia. I said to them: Who said that we are hostile to Saudi Arabia? And when was that? Haven’t we sent messages to her since the launch of the Taj rally and the southern peaceful movement? Did we not say in all stages of our struggle that the south represents a strategic depth to its security and stability? Didn’t the late southern president, Ali Salem Al-Beidh, send messages of congratulations on various occasions and ask for the support of the people of the south in restoring their state? Weren’t Saudi flags and pictures of its leaders raised in the squares of the southern peaceful movement and in the fields of resistance? Weren’t the Southern Transitional Council’s statements filled with expressions of thanks and appreciation to the Saudi leadership and people? Didn’t Commander Aidaroos Al-Zubaidi one day say: “We are soldiers of King Salman, who directs us wherever he wants”? We were blessed from the first moment by Decisive Storm. Southern President Ali Salem Al-Baidh went to Riyadh, and I accompanied him and was present. Aidaroos Al-Zubaidi and many southern leaders also traveled to Riyadh. We were always looking for partnership with Saudi Arabia, and we were never looking for rivalry with it. President Al-Beidh in Riyadh offered support for our cause, as did Commander Aidaroos Al-Zubaidi, and the answer was always: “We came to liberate Sana’a from the Houthis, and we came to return legitimacy to Sana’a. As for the South, your cause and your demands, this is your business and we will not interfere in it.” What happened next? What did the southerners offer? The comrades said: But the key is in Riyadh, and the southern country cannot come without Riyadh. I said: If that is the case, what did the southerners not offer? Haven’t the southerners been the most loyal ally over the past years? Weren’t expressions of thanks and appreciation to Saudi Arabia repeated in the speeches of the southern leaders? Didn’t the southerners postpone many of the demands of their national cause, taking into account the priorities of the war and confronting the Houthis? What about the first and second Riyadh Agreement? What about the partnership imposed on us in the government and the Presidential Leadership Council? What about receiving those who do not have land or real power to rule the south with us? Didn’t the people of the South fight on different fronts in defense of common interests? So, what’s missing? The postponed dialogue said: The situation has changed, and today there is a new opportunity, and Saudi Arabia says that it will be with what the southerners agree upon. I said: We heard this talk months ago. But where is the dialogue? It was announced and then frozen. It was said that preparations are continuing, but we have not seen anything clear yet. I do not disagree with the idea of dialogue in principle, but I fear that it will turn into a means of managing the crisis instead of resolving it, and into a tool to buy time instead of addressing the roots of the southern issue. The people of the South had previously engaged in dialogue, and there was a consultative meeting that came out with a southern national charter, and kept the door open to others. They said: You are too pessimistic. I said: Maybe. But I look at what is happening on the ground. I see that the South is becoming more complex, and I see that talk of dialogue is freezing while the national issue is taking a backseat. From the national dialogue to the regional dialogue, I told them: When we started talking about the dialogue, we were told that it is a southern dialogue that includes all national forces, components, and personalities. Then we started hearing something different. It was said that political parties and components should stay away. Then it was said that the dialogue would take place through provincial coordinators, social formations, and independent figures. Where is the national dimension of the issue? Where are the political forces that have carried the issue for decades? Where are the components that I paid high prices for? Has the southern issue become just an issue of governorates and regions? They said: What is required is to expand participation and not monopolize representation. I said: No one refuses broad participation. But expanding participation is one thing, and eliminating the political bearer of the issue is another. National issues are not managed according to the logic of regional distribution, but rather according to the logic of the comprehensive national project. The Transitional Council and Commander Aidaroos Al-Zubaidi then asked them: How can the southern street be convinced that this dialogue represents its will while bypassing the forces that a large portion of southerners consider to represent it? How can we talk about a southern dialogue when many believe that Riyadh does not want the Transitional Council and does not want Leader Aidaroos Al-Zubaidi at the forefront of the scene? Isn’t this a paradox worth stopping at? They said: The issue is bigger than the people. I said: True. The issue is bigger than people. But it is also not separate from its political reality. If millions of southerners believe that the Transitional Council represents their cause at this stage, can this fact be overcome? Is consensus built by excluding those who have the popular presence or through dialogue with them? Then I added: I fear that what is required is not a solution to the southern issue, but rather a reshaping of the southern scene itself, after the Saudi forces bombed our forces in the valley and the desert, and the insistence on dissolving the council. I fear that the goal is to empty the issue of its national and political content and turn it into an administrative file that can be contained and managed. Then I told them: There is something else I don’t understand. The continued provocation of the Southern Street by some of you, and the repeated talk about dissolving the Transitional Council, did not weaken it as you expect, but rather increased its popularity. You see millions coming out in various governorates to delegate it and declaring their rejection of any attempt to dissolve or bypass it. How do you read these popular messages? Some comrades said: It is a state of shock, and things will fade with time. I said: Maybe. But can you find a real alternative or another political bearer for the southern issue? They said: Through the South-South dialogue. I said: In the experiences of peoples and countries throughout history, there has always been a political force or movement that dominates the scene. Whether in movements for liberation from colonialism, resistance to occupation, or revolutions that established new regimes. These forces are the ones leading the state-building process, and the circle of political partnership expands later. As for the idea of building a national project through a dialogue that includes thousands of people and disparate components without a clear political center, it is an experience that is difficult to imagine its success. Then I added: If we, despite the years of joint struggle and old relations, have not yet agreed on the mechanism for restoring the south and the method of managing the next stage, how can a comprehensive consensus be reached between all these different parties and currents? There was silence again. Comrades on the path and Riyadh, then I said to them: Today you are speaking in the name of dialogue. But who do you represent? You were part of well-known political components, and you had clear political influences. Today, most of you have become individuals who only represent themselves after you left those political frameworks. How can individuals give legitimacy to an issue as large as the South’s? There was silence for a few moments. The events of Hadramaut: I told them: The majority of you said in Riyadh that they were not aware of Riyadh’s agreement to restore the valley and the desert. The comrades said: True. I said: But frankly, and as I know you and you know me, all of you wrote and declared that you are in favor of restoring our land. If we assumed that Abu Qasim told you that the decision was taken without Riyadh’s knowledge, would you have refused? The answer was: silence again. The question of returning home. Then I asked them: When will you return home? Five months and you are in Riyadh. When will you return to Aden, Hadramaut, Socotra, Al-Dhalea, Lahj, Abyan, Shabwa, and Al-Mahra? They said: Things are good, and our presence here is necessary for the success of the dialogue. I said with a smile: I hope so. In a joking way, I told them that I fear that this will be a long, forced hospitality of no less than two years. You will be scapegoats for a period, but the homeland is the natural place for any southern dialogue. The pulse of the street in the south is closer to people’s understanding than any meeting hall outside the country. Then I added: When you return home, we will meet again. Perhaps the picture is clearer. Perhaps you will be more free to express what you have seen and felt during these months. I have known you to be honest, especially those who fought in the fields of honor and valor, and therefore I say that we will have another conversation when you return. When I asked about those who had fallen ill, the comrades said: These people have weak faith in the cause, and most of them rose to our cause after 2015. I agree with this proposition. Services and political responsibility. Then the conversation moved to the conditions of people in the south. I said to them: Don’t you see that services are deteriorating day after day? Don’t you see the extent of the suffering that the citizen is experiencing due to the collapse of electricity and basic services and the decline in the value of salaries? In the past, many held the Transitional Council responsible for every failure that occurred. Today, the Transitional Council is no longer a partner in the government or in the Presidential Leadership Council in the manner in which it was accused of bearing those responsibilities. Who bears responsibility now? They said: The northern powers are still tampering with the south and obstructing many issues. In addition to the wrong choices in the government and the presidential office, I said: But the reality today says that the director, agent, and political reference are the same for everyone. The government, the Presidential Command Council, and most of the effective political and military tools all operate within the framework sponsored by Riyadh. Therefore, the political and moral responsibility for the continuation of this situation cannot be separated from Saudi Arabia as the most influential party on the scene. They said: Riyadh supports, but does not interfere in the decisions of the Presidential Command Council or the government. I said: This is an explanation that is often put forward, but the ordinary citizen does not look at the details in this way. He looks at the end result on the ground. When crises and services continue to deteriorate, he looks for the party capable of influencing and changing, not the party that exchanges explanations with others. Major issues are not resolved away from the people, and no political project can succeed if it is separated from the street it claims to represent. An addition that I thought was necessary here. Yesterday, when my friend from Riyadh saw the arrests that took place in Aden, he sent me a message on WhatsApp in which he said verbatim: Worse than the Afash forces…that time has returned… my compulsion to make sacrifices. At the end of those long dialogues, I did not come out with hostility to anyone. To be fair, some are still steadfast and steadfast, and I did not come out with the conviction that the south must enter into a dispute with Saudi Arabia. Rather, I came away with a more firm conviction that frankness with siblings is the shortest path to building trust. We and Riyadh are neighbors. The common interests, history, geography, and security that unite us are greater than any differences. The southerners were never enemies of Saudi Arabia. But Riyadh must also read reality as it is. The South today is not just a political issue, but rather an issue of people, will, identity and aspirations that cannot be bypassed or jumped over. I still believe that the path to understanding does not pass through broad political festivals called south-south dialogue, in which there are multiple agendas and different references, but rather through a frank and responsible Saudi-south dialogue that recognizes the existing facts, respects the popular will, and searches for the common interests of both parties. As for the South, despite everything said about divisions, it is more in agreement than some think. We may differ in political methods and jurisprudence, but we agree on the major constants, and we agree that the South is an issue for the people and the future. That is why I said to my companions at the end of our discussions: Our readings of the stage may differ, but the issue that we carried together has not changed. You are betting that the key is in Riyadh, and we see that the key starts from the will of the people on their land. Perhaps time will reveal that the truth requires both things; A sincere partnership with our brothers, and a national will that does not give up its right to decide its future. The question remains open to everyone: Does the solution start from Riyadh or from the will of the South? As for me, after many years of struggle, dreaming, and waiting, I still believe that peoples are the ones who create their own destiny, and that nations may be born late, but they will not die as long as there are those among their children who believe in them and carry their cause, generation after generation.
