Mass Civil Disobedience, Demonstrations Roaming Aden, Condemning Pro- US-Saudi Government

On Oct 3, 2021

Citizens reported that the protest in Sira district demanded shops close their doors and implement a comprehensive civil disobedience. The protest is currently circling Al-Taweel Street, Al-Za`far Street and the neighboring area.

The people chanted against the high prices and the economic decline, calling on all shops to close their doors for fear of being attacked.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has estimated that nearly 2.3 million children in Yemen under the age of five will suffer acute malnutrition this year, 400,000 of whom will be classed as severe acute malnutrition and could die if they do not receive urgent treatment, the report says.

With inflation likely to continue spiralling higher in response to exchange-rate depreciation and rising international food and fuel prices, however, the value of external aid diminishes quickly, while Yemen’s balance of payments and reserves are progressively worsening, it added.

To stabilize the macroeconomy and underpin a recovery, according to the IMF following its June visit to the country, Yemen needs to mobilize additional resources and accelerate the process of rebuilding institutions. “Securing additional external support would help to close the large financing gap, thereby curbing depreciation and inflation,” the team led by Brett Rayner concluded following the mission.

But without a quick resolution to the war, the IMF also warned, Yemen’s near-term economic prospects will remain decidedly dim. The continuation of the global pandemic, alongside the lack of external financing sources, will have a crippling impact on gross domestic product (GDP), which the Fund stated it expects to contract by a further 2 percent in 2021 after declining 8.5 percent in 2020. The Fund also noted that the war has weakened and fragmented Yemen’s policy capacity, thus limiting the authorities’ ability to respond effectively to the crisis.

A lasting ceasefire is thus required before Yemen can even think of initiating economic-stabilisation measures and moving towards unification. And with no end in sight to the unrest, Yemen’s economy will remain in a deep crisis.