Yemen Feature: A View from the Ground of the Youth Movement (Al-Akhali)

Rafat Al-Akhali, a youth activist and the co-founder of the Resonate! Yemen initiative, writes for Muftah:

The Yemeni revolution, which began in January 2011, has brought hundreds of thousands of youths to the streets, transforming these individuals into grassroots political activists and ending many years of youth disenfranchisement in Yemeni politics. This article will look at the current configuration of Yemen’s youth movement, and outline potential ways in which the international community can provide this movement with much needed support.

The Evolution of Yemen’s Youth Movement

The development and organization of Yemen’s youth movement has not been instantaneous but, rather, has taken several months. At the start of the revolution, the youth gathered in hundreds of small groups. These groups then formed alliances with each other, eventually creating cross-country youth coalitions. The youth movement’s diverse membership also contributed to its growth and development. For instance, while some leaders took to the streets, living in open-air squares dubbed ‘Change’ and ‘Freedom’ and rallying grass-root support for the protests, other leaders interfaced with international media, arranged meetings with representatives from the international community, and spread news about the protests via blogs and social media sites.

The protests, which have been ongoing for the last four months, gave youth leaders and their movement time to mature and overcome deep fissures among group members. During this period, the message of the youth movement has also evolved, moving away from simply calling for the ouster of the regime and towards developing a comprehensive list of demands that include establishing a parliamentarian system in Yemen and adopting an electoral system based on proportionate representation. The youth leaders who have emerged from this process have also begun to challenge the traditional influence of Yemen’s established political parties.

Towards the end of April, many members of the youth movement began thinking about and discussing next steps, including their future role in post-revolution Yemen. These varying views on the movement’s future track the diverse political configurations among Yemen’s youth and fall along the following lines:

a. Non-Political Youth: These consist of youth who are disinterested in taking an active role in the "political process" during the post-revolutionary period. Instead, their goal is for the movement to become a grassroots, opposition group focused on mobilizing, when necessary, to protest unfavorable government policies.

b. Youth aligned to existing political parties: These consist of youth who were members of established opposition parties before the revolution started, and intend to return to their parties during the post-revolutionary period. Their reasons for returning to these groups include a desire to change the parties from within and to play a more active role within the parties.

c. Independent youth: These include independent youth activists who believe that the only way for the movement to sustain its position in post-revolution Yemen is for it to become part of the political process. This group is further subdivided into two categories:

I. Youth who are working on establishing their own “youth” political parties: Many of these youth are convinced that the majority of existing political parties and politicians are corrupt and ill-suited to represent the post-revolution state the youth are demanding.

II. Independent youth who are convinced that success in the political arena requires experience in politics and who are therefore looking to join with established, progressive and trustworthy political figures to form new parties that will represent the youth’s vision of the new Yemen. An example of this is the newly formed Justice and Building party that is composed of well-known political figures in Yemen as well as emerging youth leaders.

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