Mereja Forum

[Abe Abraham]

https://al-akhbar.com/Arab/72533

Racism distorts the face of Yemen

Sana'a |

The suicide bombing that occurred at noon on Wednesday in Sana'a, which killed ten soldiers, took place in front of the southern gate of the Police College. It is the same college that is located tens of meters away from the largest cemetery in Sana'a, "Khuzaymeh Cemetery". There will be no difficulty in transporting the martyrs to their graves, as the distance separating them from it is not so far. It will not be costly or effortless to do here.

But the suicide bombing was not the only bombing that Yemen witnessed that day. Within a distance not far from the same place, the Yemeni Parliament building is located. At a time roughly parallel to the occurrence of the suicide bombing, a member of the Council of the General People's Congress Party, Sheikh Muhammad Naji al-Shaif, was causing an explosion in that building when he threatened to “educate the Minister of Finance,” Sakher Al-Wajih, as a result of a verbal disagreement between them, after the latter raised his hand asking for a point of order. Objection to what the deputy said on behalf of the prime minister, but he did not stop here; The person of the Prime Minister, Muhammad Salem Basindwa, himself attacked the person who was not present at the session, and the Sheikh MP said loudly: “We want a Yemeni prime minister to rule us because whoever heads the government is Eritrean or Somali.”

Blatant racist talk, most of the parliamentarians did not find a solution to respond to it except to withdraw from the session, after those who said it refused to apologize for the expressions that he had thrown his tongue against the prime minister, but what was like yesterday night. The Sheikh's speech appeared as a duplicate of statements made by the ousted President Ali Abdullah Saleh regarding the current prime minister when he was head of the National Dialogue Committee at the end of last year. At that time, the deposed said, according to a source in the ruling party, "The last person who knows about Yemen's affairs is in the symposium and has no connection with it." He added, "It is better for him to continue his interest in Somali affairs, an expert in them." Racist talk emanating from the same source and reference specialized in racial affairs towards personalities whom those in charge of the affairs of the General People's Congress Party, which were rulers, believed that they landed from Mars on the land of Happy Yemen in order to take from him the happiness and supposed well-being in which he lives.


When former President Ali Abdullah Saleh stood helpless in front of a person opposing him and his policy, telling him directly: "You are Somali, Ethiopian or Eritrean, go back to your country." Salih told the opposition, Hassan Baoum, the popular leader of the Southern Movement, as told to Professor Abu Bakr Al-Saqqaf, one of the most important philosophy teachers at Sanaa University. Saleh did not hesitate to echo it to the ears of Ali Salem al-Baid, his former deputy, when the dialogue between them reached a dead end at the end of 1993.

This racism does not stop at the borders of the sheikhdom and the former presidency, but rather it reaches the borders of the street. As if it were a racist street in nature. This street is unable to compete with the African manpower from outside the Yemeni borders, and it is believed that it is competing with it for a living by obtaining high positions in international organizations and oil companies that give high salaries and in hard currency. This is because they are qualified cadres and have the expertise to qualify them to fill these jobs, but the Yemeni street overlooks their qualifications and is content to throw them with his racist words. Racism directed exclusively towards black people and not others. White foreigners do not encounter this same racism. As if the Yemeni street finds an inferiority complex within it, towards white skin only.


And there is beyond this. When a suicide bombing attack took place in the city of Aden last June and led to the death of the commander of the southern region, Salem al-Qatun, words spread at the speed of the wind, and the street heard eagerly for any incentive to push it towards a new racist attack. At the time, it was said that the perpetrator of that suicide bombing was a black-skinned Somali. Without an analysis or waiting for an official investigation into the circumstances of the operation, people believed this statement and dealt with it. He is Somali and the matter is over, and therefore all Somalis on Yemeni soil should be dealt with. So, it is the war against every Somali. It was not late to appear. On that same day, news spread about Yemeni reactions to everyone with black skin. Everyone with black skin is necessarily Somali, Eritrean or Ethiopian. Many people were evicted from their regular rented homes. In the city of Dhamar (south of Sanaa), a large number of black people were gathered in a remote camp and their freedom was held outside the law.


The same scenario was repeated a few minutes after the suicide bombing at the Police College in Sana'a, the day before yesterday. A taxi driver said, without thinking or being aware of the circumstances of the accident, "It is certainly a Somali suicide bomber who carried out this operation," as if the Somalis are innate killers, and the people of Yemeni nationality are angels and do not have evil ideas or murderous intentions! He is the Somali here, or any black-skinned person, who is necessarily accused. And in advance, he is a killer according to the impure blood that runs in his blood, and pushes him to kill any Yemeni standing in front of him. A taxi driver said, without thinking or being aware of the circumstances of the accident, "It is certainly a Somali suicide bomber who carried out this operation," as if the Somalis are innate killers, and the people of Yemeni nationality are angels and do not have evil ideas or murderous intentions! He is the Somali here or any black-skinned person who is necessarily accused. And in advance, he is a killer according to the impure blood that runs in his blood, and pushes him to kill any Yemeni standing in front of him. A taxi driver says, without thinking or being aware of the circumstances of the accident, "It is certainly a Somali suicide bomber who carried out this operation." He is the Somali here or any black-skinned person who is necessarily accused. And in advance, he is a killer according to the impure blood that runs in his blood, and pushes him to kill any Yemeni standing in front of him.


But the irony is that the racist speech directed by the deputy Sheikh Al-Shaif against the Yemeni Prime Minister, Muhammad Salem Basinda, entailed widespread reactions. Cables of solidarity and condemnation. A collective withdrawal from the Parliament sessions in protest against Al-Sharif’s words, but all of them were silent when the same words came from the side of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh. In today's symposium, he has become prime minister and the whole thing is different. So should the Yemeni become prime minister in order to find solidarity and protection from the racism that comes to him from the street, and from the House of Representatives alike? It seems that the Yemenis have become in need of another revolution against their racism in order for their revolution to be complete.


The rich people of Yemen used to boast that they dealt well with Ethiopian "workers" who work in their palaces, in contrast to the treatment these women receive in the rest of the Arab countries, but the stories that the media began to talk about say the opposite of this. Sajeh (25 years), an Ethiopian Christian girl, came to Yemen to work as a "housemaid" for a family. She left her homeland, husband and only daughter, in search of a source of life. On arrival with this family, she faced brutal treatment, as well as a state of contempt.

On August 21 2011, a police station was informed that there was a dead body of an Ethiopian woman in a hospital in Sana'a. The coroner's report stated that the victim was brutally tortured by extinguishing the cigarette [deleted] on her hand and body. Since the defendant’s father works in the judiciary, the investigation was stopped and the defendants removed from their prison.

As for the girl's body, it is still in the hospital, while her family is only demanding that it be buried in her country in light of the failure of the judiciary to resolve the case. It is one of many stories that will appear in succession, and it says that there is an inferior life residing in Yemen and no one knew anything about it.

[Somaliman]

You're talking about racism! They practise slavery openly in Yemen, and many Yemenis find this just normal!

[Roha]

You are right Somaliman. Only an Arab slave and Abid like the kezabite "kerenite" who hates himself and his own languages and identity
will deny this fact. There are many Arab slaves in the Horn region who would not defend the black Muslims in Yemen that had been living in Islamic Arab slavery for centuries.

You're talking about racism! They practise slavery openly in Yemen, and many Yemenis find this just normal!

[Somaliman]

You are right Somaliman. Only an Arab slave and Abid like the kezabite "kerenite" who hates himself and his own languages and identity
will deny this fact. There are many Arab slaves in the Horn region who would not defend the black Muslims in Yemen that had been living in Islamic Arab slavery for centuries.

You're talking about racism! They practise slavery openly in Yemen, and many Yemenis find this just normal!

There are many Arab slaves in the Horn region who would not defend the black Muslims in Yemen that had been living in Islamic Arab slavery for centuries.

They can't defend them because they're mentally enslaved themselves, and their psychological slavery is so profound that no rational means can emancipate them from such a self-inflicting slavery.

I know quite well the ones you're referring to. A number of them even behave as if they were more Arab than the fuc.king Arabs themselves. They're weak and ignorant people, who often confuse being Muslim with being Arab.

They're the house Negros of Arabs.

As strange as it might sound, they're similar to people who have been held hostage, threatened, abused, and intimidated, who are becoming emotionally attached to their captors and are feeling gratitude towards their own assailants and even trying to protect them from investigations, if not raising funds for the legal defense of their captors!

I watched that documentary a few months ago, it's really shocking! What's more shocking is that people in prominent positions of trust in the Yemeni society, including top government officials, parliamentarians, sheikhs, etc., are owning slaves openly!