By Daily Star Editorial

The leader of Yemen, President Ali Abdullah Saleh, has opted to make a seemingly dramatic political move: He has tasked his vice president with negotiating with the opposition over a transitional plan to see a transfer of power in the country.
Naturally, this would be a dramatic move if it had happened in, for example, in March of 2011.
But since it comes six months after that date, one can only shrug one’s shoulders and wonder what Saleh intends to accomplish with the announcement.

The opposition did more than shrug its shoulders – it shook its head, no, telling Saleh that the failure to agree on something concrete before engaging in negotiations was a non-starter.
Under the plan, Vice-President Abbd-Rabbu Mansour would negotiate with the coalition of opposition political parties, but since he lacks authorization to sign anything, and actually get a deal done, Saleh’s track record comes to mind.

As the Yemeni uprising evolved this year, Saleh, or those around him, repeatedly declared that the president was open to talking with his opponents, or adhering to political initiatives to end the crisis. In the end, there was back-tracking by Saleh, and the efforts would fizzle out.

The president of Yemen is currently in Saudi Arabia, where he has been since June, recovering from his wounds that he sustained in a bombing of the Presidential Palace. He has refused to hand over power to his deputy, and has rejected every meaningful step in the direction of a compromise.

It’s as if Saleh hasn’t been paying attention to the news this year. The uprising in his country erupted at the beginning of 2011, and quickly evolved into a stand-off that appears to be unwinnable through military force.
Nine months later, Saleh has brought things back to square one, and not even that is certain, due to his earlier reneging on commitments. He has failed to realize that his regime represents the kind of obsolete and atrophied 30-year-old dictatorship that became common in the Arab world. Such regimes are a prime reason for ridiculing the region’s state of political development.

Leaders in the Middle East should have learned by now that they can’t continue to ignore the legitimate demands of their people. In the case of Yemen, this means a desire for real, tangible political change, and not vague promises about transitional periods.

Perhaps Saleh is serious, and the initiative will lead to something positive to defuse the tension and unrest that have hurt his country. Yemen might be off the radar of many people, but the stakes in this crisis are high. There are complicated, multiple fronts to deal with: tribalism, north-south tension, the presence of Al-Qaeda, and even the maritime piracy that is centered nearby. Further paralysis at the top in Yemen will make things that much more difficult for the country’s future.