Election Countdown 10...9...8...7...6...5...4...

Four days to the September 20 presidential and local elections and counting. I guess I should be releasing a new video on the topic, but there are so many facets of the elections that I am having difficulties coming up with a coherent script, and there are so many more great posters that go up every day faster than I can photograph them, but they are so great that I don't want to leave them out. If you ever played the computer game Zork: Grand Inquisitor, then you may get a joke I am thinking about making involving campaign posters and one of the presidential candidates. Oh, what the hey. Here you go.

I watched an interview on al-Jazeera with Faisal bin Shamlan (the only credible opposition presidential candidate in the history of Yemen). I am not fluent yet so of course I did not understand everything that was being said. I was in the frustrating position of understanding the question, or the answer, but usually not both at the same time. I did get some gems out of the interview though.

-Many tribal leaders just want a normal, representative government. They are leaning towards bin Shamlan.
-On the off chance that bin Shamlan actually wins a majority (estimated as up to 70%!) we don't know whether mechanisms to transfer power exist, and whether they would work.
-Several accusations of corruption were hurled at the current regime.

I've been having a heck of a time arguing with some American students here who insist that the US would not work with bin Shamlan because he his Islahi, and that the disruption of order would be too great if he were to win. Now I can see martial law being declared and other illegal tactics, including violence, to prevent bin Shamlan from taking power if he were to win. But that we would refuse to work with him becuase he is Islahi? False statement! Although bin Shamlan represents a coalition of five parties that includes Islah (the premier opposition party, happens to be Islamist), bin Shamlan is otherwise an independent who does not actually belong to any of those five parties, so he's not a Nasserite or a Socialist either, and any one who says that he is, is committing a fallacy. I fully understand why the U.S. government works with Saleh, because really we have no other choice, and he does have the tribal/political connections to get things done. I'd say that if bin Shamlan wins the election, that would be pretty solid proof that he has enough support to rule, expecially since he has to win despite all the voter fraud that I predict will occur.

Bin Shamlan's basic platform, aside from fighting poverty, is one of political reform to reinstate old term limits and have a truly independent judiciary, among other elements of reform. His campaign promises are actually a step in the right direction towards real democracy, a goal which the U.S. swears that it wants. Electing bin Shamlan is not the same thing as electing Hamas or Hizbollah. Bin Shamlan has no radical foreign policy agenda that the Bush administration would have a hard time swallowing. A more democratic Yemen would show her neighbors a thing or two. The only problem I could see with bin Shamlan is the possibility of instability and violence in a prolonged succession struggle.