Yemen Monitor / Newsroom:
The Yemeni Network for Rights and Freedoms has accused the dissolved Southern Transitional Council (STC) of running a parallel financial system based on imposing illegal levies and seizing public and private resources outside state institutions, affirming that the monthly funds collected from these activities exceed 22.4 billion Yemeni riyals.
In a report issued on Wednesday, the Network said it had documented what it described as a systematic financial corruption network managed by council leaders, including imposing fees on petroleum derivatives, cement companies, and through security checkpoints, noting that the funds are collected outside the public treasury and without any legal basis.
According to the report, the total documented levies amounted to more than “22 billion and 436 million Yemeni riyals monthly,” pointing out that the largest portion comes from the petroleum derivatives sector, where illegal fees are imposed on fuel shipments upon arrival at Aden ports and during storage in refineries, totaling over 21.6 billion riyals, which it said has been reflected in rising prices of fuel, electricity, transportation, and basic services.
The report added that levy operations extended to cement companies and factories, as well as daily fees imposed on trucks and oil and gas tankers at security checkpoints, in addition to what it described as extortion targeting commercial shops and exchange companies under various names, generating tens of millions of riyals daily without any oversight or accountability.
The Network affirmed that the figures in the report represent only the minimum of facts that could be documented according to human rights standards, noting that there are other resources and sectors not covered by the report, including land and sea ports, revenues of some public institutions, oil and gas tankers, in addition to the seizure of land and public property—meaning, according to the report, that the actual scale of the financial corruption system far exceeds the announced figures.
The Network considered that addressing these practices goes beyond the financial aspect and represents a test for the rule of law and the restoration of state institutions, warning that ignoring illegal levies reinforces impunity and undermines citizens’ economic rights.
It demanded the opening of an independent and comprehensive judicial investigation into all documented facts, holding accountable the political, military, and security leaders involved, and recovering the funds and returning them to the public treasury. It also called on the Human Rights Council and UN mechanisms to include economic violations among accountability priorities in Yemen.
The report’s release coincides with directives from the Attorney General for the precautionary seizure of the dissolved STC’s funds and its bank accounts at banks, financial institutions, and exchange companies, along with taking measures to recover public funds and property suspected of being seized through illegitimate means.
