On Jan. 21, Houthi militias detained Yemen’s President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi and kept him under house arrest after he refused to rubber-stamp their decisions. The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and United Nations Security Council (UNSC), as well as many countries, condemned the Houthi action and repeatedly demanded his immediate release. The Houthis refused to comply.
On Feb. 20, Hadi was able to escape his Houthi captors and reach Aden, the winter capital of Yemen. His statement, issued the next day (Feb. 21), clearly dispelled some misconceived notions about events taking place in Yemen since last September. He described as a “coup” what the Houthi militias have done since Sept. 21, 2014 — the day they entered Sanaa by force. After their takeover, Houthis took drastic and unprecedented actions aimed at “tearing apart Yemen’s national unity and social fabric,” the presidential statement said. By the use of force and threats of violence, they coerced President Hadi and other officials into making decisions designed to bolster Houthi control and weaken their opponents.
Hadi declared “all steps, measures, and appointments” taken since Sept. 21, 2014 “null, void and without legal merit.”
You may recall that Houthis made their move to unseat Hadi and his government after the conclusion of the National Dialogue Conference and the adoption of its final outcome documents. Ironically, Houthis were part of that dialogue process that lasted almost a year and made all its decisions by consensus. They apparently changed their mind and sought to impose their will by force.
The next steps after the conference, according to the GCC initiative and its implementation mechanism, would have been the drafting of a constitution, adopting it in a referendum, and holding presidential and parliamentary elections. However, after the drafting of the constitution, the Houthi coup disrupted all that: They took government institutions by force, raided military camps and plundered their material. They then detained President Hadi, Prime Minister Khaled Bahhah, key ministers and other officials. They also issued a draconian “constitutional declaration,” establishing a new order. They also started a new “dialogue” according to their own terms. That dialogue repeatedly failed and Houthis used every failure to further consolidate their control.
Before and during his detention, Hadi was coerced into making some decisions and pressured to tender his resignation. Under Yemen’s law, his resignation can become effective only if accepted by the Parliament. However, attempts to convene a special session of the Parliament to accept the resignation failed and as such the resignation never came into force.
Of course, in almost every legal tradition, decisions made under duress have no merit and can be voidable. Therefore, President Hadi, in his Feb. 21 statement, declared all decisions made under his or his government’s name since Sept. 21, 2014, the day of the Houthi coup, null and void. In addition, he annulled all decisions made by the Houthis since they were made outside the legitimate constitutional framework of Yemen. He also notified the Parliament that he had rescinded his resignation.
Hadi declared his determination to resume the political transition process, which was disrupted by the Houthis. That process, according to Hadi’s statement, is mainly based on the GCC initiative and its implementation mechanism, which were endorsed by the UN Security Council. The presidential elections of Feb. 21, 2012 and the outcomes of the National Dialogue Conference represented some of the early steps of the process. The next steps would be adoption of the new constitution followed by elections.
To complete that process, Hadi called on the National Oversight Commission for Dialogue Outcomes to convene immediately, either in Aden or Taizz — safe locations outside Houthi control.
Hadi called for the release of his Prime Minister Bahhah and other ministers and officials, who had been kidnapped by Houthi militias. He also called on all military and civilian government institutions to abide by the constitutional and legal framework, in an apparent reference to some units that capitulated to the Houthi onslaught and started working or coordinating with them. The GCC echoed those demands in a statement issued on Feb. 23 welcoming Hadi’s resumption of his presidential duties in Aden after evading his Houthi captors.
Houthis were thrown off balance by Hadi’s escape and subsequent decisions. They reacted by attempting to accelerate their takeover; using the “dialogue” they had initiated to rubber-stamp their coup. However, that dialogue failed to reach agreement. Instead, several of the groups represented in those deliberations declared loyalty to President Hadi and headed to Aden to meet with him. This in turn infuriated the Houthis, who rounded up more ministers and Hadi’s relatives.
