Houthi militiamen stand guard in a pick-up truck mounted with a machinegun at a checkpoint in Sanaa yesterday.

DPA/Sanaa


A campaign of civil disobedience began yesterday in southern Yemen to protest the abduction of the president’s chief of staff by Shia Houthi rebels.
The Houthis said they were behind the abduction of Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak, the chief of the presidential office, to protest a disputed draft of a new constitution.
Tribes in southern Yemen, to which Mubarak belongs, vowed that the civil disobedience will continue until he is released.
“All government institutions have suspended their work in solidarity with the southerners,” Awwad bin al-Wazir, a tribal chief in the southern province of Shabwa, said.
Roads joining southern and northern Yemen were also blocked by tribal protesters, locals said.  
“Shabwa has been paralysed,” a local journalist said, asking not to be named for security reasons.  
Mubarak, a businessman-turned-politician, was abducted on Saturday by gunmen from his car in the capital Sanaa while he was on his way to the president’s office reportedly to present a draft constitution opposed by the Houthis.
Media reports said the draft constitution provides for turning Yemen into a federal state composed of six provinces, a plan seen by the Houthis as weakening their power that has grown in recent months.
In October, President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi picked Mubarak as prime minister - a choice opposed by the Houthis. Mansour turned down the nomination.
Yemen has been mired in recent months in a heightened power struggle between the Houthis and Hadi, who has ruled the country since 2012.
“Yemeni authorities left us no other option,” Mohamed al-Bakheiti, a Houthi official, said referring to Mubarak’s abduction.
“We repeatedly tried to convince authorities to stop the implementation of steps detrimental to the country’s interests, but to no avail,” he said without elaborating.
The Houthis have swept across Yemen since seizing control of most of Sanaa in September, taking advantage of the weakness of the central government.  
The Houthis’ territorial expansion has angered local Sunni tribes and drawn a string of attacks from Al Qaeda.
Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the Arab world, also faces a secessionist movement in the south.