In Yemen’s energy-rich southeastern province of Hadramawt, a tribal leader and politician has taken a high-risk gamble to bring his government to heel.
Amr bin Habresh, the leader of the Hadramawt Tribes Alliance (HTA), has deployed armed men around major oil fields on the province’s plateau, cutting off supplies, depriving the already cash-strapped government of a source of revenue and positioning himself as a key figure vying for power in war-torn Yemen.
“We seek to halt the wasting of Hadramawt’s oil and mineral treasures while the state remains paralyzed,” bin Habresh told New Lines in a rare interview from a home near the oil fields. He lives in al-Olaeb, a small hamlet on the way to oil reserves managed by Masila Petroleum Exploration and Production Company (PetroMasila), which is three hours from Hadramawt’s provincial capital, al-Mukalla.
The 40-year-old bin Habresh is also the head of the Hadramawt Inclusive Conference, the HTA political wing. A father of five children, he rose to notoriety in late 2013 when army forces assassinated his uncle, Saad bin Habresh, in Hadramawt’s Seiyun, prompting local tribes to rally around him in his quest for vengeance against the assassins. He then declared the establishment of the HTA, which wanted, in addition to the killer’s surrender, more control over Hadramawt’s riches, government and security.
The Yemeni tribal leader and politician Amr bin Habresh has halted oil supplies to the government. (Rashed bin Shoubraq)
Following a tribal mediation, the state apologized and offered the HTA millions of dollars in compensation, as well as cars and firearms. Since then, Amr bin Habresh has remained a prominent actor who poses a challenge to the state as the head of an influential group located near oil deposits.
In the middle of last year, bin Habresh left his house in al-Mukalla, where he was Hadramawt’s first deputy governor. He left for the Hadramawt plateau, which possesses Yemen’s greatest oil reserves, and gathered allied tribal members from his political movement. He then announced his intention to block oil flow from the fields to the province and other Yemeni towns, among other escalatory actions aimed at pressuring the Yemeni government to respond to the demands of the “people of Hadramawt,” whom he claimed to represent.
Unlike the two-story, rock-built structure encircled by a beautiful wall, the room where he received his guests and the meals he gave us suggested modest and frugal living, whether by accident or design. He sat on a colorful traditional sofa a few inches high, embellished with pillows; the worn-out brown carpet showed signs of age, and the walls were covered in cracks and cobwebs.
“The people of Hadramawt demand that Hadramawt be among the political parties participating in decision-making in the country,” bin Habresh said as he leaned against the patterned cushion, defining the first demand of his movement.
“The other demand is seeking to improve people’s living conditions and includes stopping the devaluation of the Yemeni riyal. The nations who interfered in Yemen are responsible for improving the exchange rate and solving the issue of currency degradation. They pay billions to other nations; why aren’t they helping us,” bin Habresh said.
Yemen has been embroiled for more than a decade in a war — between the Iran-backed Houthis in northern Yemen and the internationally recognized Yemeni government — which has killed and injured thousands of people, displaced millions more and plunged the country into the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, according to international aid organizations. Since assuming power in late 2014, the Houthis have controlled the country’s central and northern regions, including the capital, Sanaa, which is home to almost 70% of the country’s population.
The Presidential Leadership Council (PLC), a group of eight dueling men who represent Yemen’s major political, tribal and geographical forces, controls the rest of the country and has established its headquarters in the southern port city of Aden, despite spending the majority of their time outside the country. The PLC, chaired by former interior minister Rashad al-Alimi, was established in April 2022 in Saudi Arabia’s capital when former President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi announced his delegation of power to the council.
In March 2015, Saudi Arabia led a coalition of partner nations, including the United Arab Emirates, in a military intervention to drive the Houthis out of Yemeni territory and restore the internationally recognized president’s authority.
Hadramawt is Yemen’s biggest province, based on a historical kingdom of the same name. People of Hadramawt are recognized for their nationalist Hadrami pride, which centers on the idea that millions of people throughout South Asia, India and East Africa are descended from Hadramawt natives. Every two months, the Yemeni government, which controls the country’s oil resources, sells 2 million barrels of crude oil from oil fields in Hadramawt and 600,000 barrels from oil fields in the southern province of Shabwa, providing the government with a vital source of cash.
Bin Habresh called for an end to protracted power outages, the collapse of the health and education sectors, and the enlistment of thousands of provincial residents in security and armed forces. “We also advocate for improvements to power, healthcare, education and security services. Although Hadramawt profits have helped to build Yemen over the last 30 years, it continues to have terrible power services. We also want large-scale recruitment of Hadrami people [in security and the army] since Hadramawt is huge and expansive, rich in minerals and has a long coastline.”
In late 2022, the Houthis attacked oil facilities in Hadramawt and Shabwa with drones after the Yemeni government turned down their suggestion of sharing oil earnings, effectively stopping oil shipments and depriving the government of its main source of income.
Violence has occurred in several government-controlled towns as public dissatisfaction has grown over delayed government wages and amid surging inflation caused by the Yemeni riyal’s rapid depreciation. The currency reached 2,300 riyals against the dollar in February, up from 250 riyals in early 2015.
Critics of bin Habresh contend that the whole nation, not only Hadramawt, is experiencing a growing humanitarian catastrophe as a consequence of the conflict and that public services such as electricity, health care and others are failing across Yemen, including Aden, where power is out most of the time. “We are not compelled to associate our own destiny with that of others,” bin Habresh said. “Aden might be riddled with corruption, but we must not be like them. Yemen has enough wealth, but corruption is eating away at the country. What is the cause of the shortage of services in Aden? It is because individuals are squandering tremendous sums of money.”
Amr bin Habresh, second from the right, engaged in conversation with his tribal companions about the uprising against the authorities. (Rashed bin Shoubraq)
Unlike other Yemeni politicians and military officials, who would strip guests of their phones and other equipment for security reasons, we were not subjected to searches when we arrived at the interview location. Three Toyota pickup trucks armed with Soviet-era heavy machine guns stood guard outside the premises, as did a white armored Toyota Land Cruiser. Bin Habresh’s soldiers don’t wear military uniforms, but rather traditional garb such as futa, a fabric wrapped over the lower half of the body, T-shirts, colorful headscarves wrapped around their heads and thick jackets to shield themselves from the cold.
Following the total suspension of oil exports, the Yemeni government redirected a portion of the oil from PetroMasila to Aden to maintain the operation of its power stations, while also channeling additional fuel to the local market and power stations in Hadramawt. To offset the government’s declining revenues, the local authorities in Hadramawt have increased the price of each liter of petroleum sold in the local market by several hundred riyals. By accumulating billions of riyals, this initiative allowed the authorities to finance critical projects.
Bin Habresh said that the distribution of oil from PetroMasila is corrupt, and the recipients of gasoline were not clear about how much fuel they received, how it was distributed or the earnings it generated. He asserted that the process is crooked and that some oil tankers are diverted or sold illegally. So on Feb. 2, bin Habresh ordered his forces to prevent gasoline tankers from delivering petroleum from PetroMasila.
This included fuel intended for power stations in Aden and for sale by the local authority there. As a consequence, Aden was thrown into darkness, and authorities from Hadramawt province warned that their financial reserves would soon be depleted. Bin Habresh allowed just 500,000 gallons of fuel to be transported to Hadramawt’s power stations. “There is an extensive corruption lobby. We did not suspend anything connected to power or health. Corruption is occurring under the cover of subsidized fuel.”
As Aden residents and the state electricity company pleaded with him to continue supplying fuel to the city to lessen power outages, he blamed the government’s ineptitude. “We don’t want to harm Aden as a community. Aden has a state, revenue and representatives on the presidential council. The government should help Aden with services.”
The government-run electricity provider in Hadramawt accused the tribal coalition of exacerbating power outages in their own province, which have climbed from 12 to almost 20 hours per day.
To ensure that fuel is supplied properly and to combat smuggling, the HTA established a commission to supervise the allocation of fuel to public entities. The procedure begins when a government organization, such as the government-run electrical foundation, submits a request to the committee for the quantity of fuel needed to power its stations around the province.
The committee submits the request to PetroMasila, which ships the petroleum via tanker. To prevent tampering or diversion of the cargo, the committee inspects the gasoline once it leaves the corporation and follows it until it reaches its destination. The electricity provider notifies the committee that the fuel has arrived and provides information on how to distribute it. The HTA provides data on fuel distribution to public entities on social media, including tanker driver names, plate numbers and cargo quantities for each truck, which bin Habresh argues is designed to increase openness.
In January, the PLC seemed to give in to the pressure from bin Habresh and his coalition, announcing a package of assurances to satisfy Hadramawt’s “rightful” demands.
The council ordered that revenues from the sale of crude oil storage facilities in Hadramawt be used to create two new power stations in the province. It also ordered that Hadramawt-based politicians be included in peace talks over the future of the country, that a hospital in Ghayl bin Yamin district, the birthplace of Amr bin Habresh, be built and that the people of Hadramawt be enlisted in the army. The council has launched an inquiry into claims of wrongdoing at PetroMasila.
Bin Habresh is dissatisfied with the declaration, saying that the council is procrastinating and has made no actual steps toward fulfilling the commitments. “We have no issue with meeting with them to carry on those pledges. However, they have not made any steps towards implementation.”
Bin Habresh has continued to question the council’s legitimacy, arguing that Hadramawt deserved a position in it. His alliance established a local army made up of 30,000 armed men, which is dubbed the Hadramawt Protection Forces, to protect the province’s oil facilities and coasts and defend against any future attack by Yemeni factions, cementing his domination of the oil fields. It has also escalated rhetoric around autonomy for the region.
Bin Habresh was cautious in his critiques of the Saudi-led coalition, encouraging the Arab alliance to treat his organization “justly.” He has rebuffed invites from Saudi and UAE authorities to travel to Riyadh and Abu Dhabi to discuss what he wants, insisting that he would only talk about resolving the deadlock and his demands in the region where he lives.
When the interview ended, bin Habresh was joined by a group of tribal leaders who serve as his advisers, counseling him on how to proceed with his goals and consulting with him on mediations.
During their post-lunch meetings, his advisers expressed irritation with months of stagnation, with many urging more forceful action to shatter the status quo. “We suggested to the sheikh to escalate more forcefully, but he asked us to be patient,” said an elderly tribal leader named Ghaythan Al-Jabri.
The men at the checkpoint were equipped with AK-47 rifles, a few RPGs and machine guns mounted on Toyota pickup trucks — with no sign of heavy equipment. The tribal alliance’s checkpoints are distinguishable from other military posts in Hadramawt by the men’s transitional dress and flag.
Surrounded by men waving flags and weapons to get the attention of the cameras, Al-Jabri cited the determination of U.S. President Donald Trump to reclaim the White House as a model for his own movement. “We are determined to battle on, just as Trump did when he declared his intention to reclaim the presidency, and ultimately succeeded.”
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