Al-Thawra editorial: No Truce Until Salaries Are Paid

SANAA, Jul. 31 (YPA) – The cutting of the salaries of more than one million employees throughout the republic was an orchestrated and deliberately aggressive crime committed by the countries of the Saudi-led coalition.
The aim was to bring the Yemenis to their knees and subject them to poverty and starvation. It is a heinous crime by the standards of every charter and code of laws because it is an act of genocide, commonly recognized as a disgraceful act.

This conspiracy and act of piracy, which targets the Central Bank of Yemen and started with the fugitive “President” Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi’s decision to transfer the bank’s operations and management headquarters to Aden in September 2016, has left Yemenis without salaries since that date and the Yemeni nation without a monetary institution. This crime has doubled the suffering of every Yemeni without exception, because it’s social and economic effects are far reaching.

Before that, the Central Bank of Yemen in the capital Sana’a had routinely paid the salaries of all government employees, reaching people in every Yemeni province without interruption. Even many companions of Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, Hadi and senior mercenaries were getting paid via the bank in Sana’a.

The central bank had been working effectively in providing its financial services at the national level, paying the salaries of 1.2 million Yemeni public servants, protecting the value of the national currency in front of foreign currencies, covering the import bill in foreign currencies as well as paying foreign debts and maintaining the confidence of global financial institutions, until the Saudi coalition and its mercenaries carried out this heinous crime and targeted the central bank, the result of which being that Yemenis lost their salaries, lost their bank, and lost the foundations of their economic stability.

The mercenary Hadi had pledged (on behalf of the coalition), to pay the salaries of government employees in all provinces, but they have not paid a single salary since they committed this heinous act. The time has come for Yemenis to regain their looted wealth from the coalition of aggression and its mercenaries.

They moved the central bank to Aden and have controlled its foreign exchange assets abroad. They printed more than 5 trillion in foreign currencies under the pretext of enhancing cash flow and payroll.

They have taken control over the country’s resources such as our crude oil, gas, customs, taxes, port resources, airports and outlets, and not only that but they also looted our precious marine wealth and are still plundering it on a daily basis.

They transferred oil and gas revenues to the National Bank of Saudi Arabia and confiscated them instead of using that money to pay the salaries of their people, which a fundamental right; The mercenaries have used this wealth for personal villas, investments and buying real estate in Turkey, Egypt and the Gulf states. Saudi Arabia used it to deposit billions of dollars into it’s national bank and the UAE did the same.

Today, with the pursuit to renew the UN-brokered truce in Yemen, the US, the European powers and the Gulf States see it as urgent and necessary to protect their control over Yemen’s vast energy sources; But our urgent need is to pay those salaries of Yemeni state employees, which have been looted by the coalition of aggression since October 2016.

If the US administration and European governments seek to ensure that their citizens have access to fuel; However, there are 1.3 million Yemeni citizens supporting about six million of their relatives who have lost their salaries and livelihoods. Their salaries must be paid before any agreement is reached, salaries are a matter of right and there is no way to renew the truce only with guarantees.

The UN envoy, the President of the US, the heads of the European states, the Saudis, the mediators, sponsors, negotiators and messengers should realize that the only way to renew the truce, begins with the payment of salaries to government employees and ensuring that these salaries are distributed on a monthly basis, via the revenues accrued through our oil, gas, customs and ports revenues and other forms of wealth looted by the countries of the aggression and their mercenaries. Not from anywhere else.

 Translated by Emad al-Marshahi