Ibrahim al-Hamdi

During al-Hamdi’s rule, North Yemen witnessed remarkable economic growth, with the country’s GDP rising from 21.5 percent in 1974 to 56.1 percent in 1977. Its per capita income rose by 300 percent in the same period. Al-Hamdi was also planning to establish more democratic institutions in the country by founding what he called “popular conventions.” The purpose of these conventions was to “prepare the groundwork for eventual elections” in North Yemen, according to WikiLeaks documents. However, the tribal forces that allegedly conspired with Saudi Arabia against al-Hamdi did not allow his plans for North Yemen to come to fruition. On October 11, 1977, he was assassinated, along with his brother, in his vice president’s house in Sana’a.

Then, he became in the era of President Abdullah as-Sallal the commander of the commandos, then the responsibility for the western, eastern, and central provinces in 1972 then he was promoted to become the Deputy Prime Minister for Internal Affairs, then he was appointed to the position of the higher representative Commander of the Armed Forces, then on 13 June 1974 he was an effective member of the officers who ran the white military coup overthrowing the Judge Abdul Rahman al-Iryani in the revolutionary correction movement of 13 June 1974 and handed over all the president's and the members' of the republican council authorities to the military forces which represented in the leadership of the general and senior officers mentioned: Ahmad Ghashmi, Yahya Mutawakil, Mujahid Abu Shawareb, Ali Al-Shibh, Hammoud Pedder, Ali Alilla'a, AED Abu Meat, Ali Abu Lohoum, and added later Abdaziz Abdul Ghani and Abdullah Abdulalim.

When al-Hamdi came to power in 1974, North Yemen lacked the most basic services and infrastructure. He created a five-year development plan supervised by a number of committees, which encouraged local communities to contribute “to road construction, school building, and water networks.” In an unprecedented move, al-Hamdi allocated 31 percent of North Yemen’s annual budget to education. Believing that education was the cornerstone to development and progress, al-Hamdi implemented a free breakfast program for pupils in remote rural areas to increase access to basic schooling. Moreover, Al-Hamdi made a number of executive decisions during his rule to increase the role of government and promote citizenship and equality. His efforts to eradicate tribal loyalty (including in the military) and establish the rule of law in a country devastated by years of civil conflict were ground-breaking in the Arab world during the 1970s. Al-Hamdi abolished the Ministry of Tribal Affairs (a body he believed was an obstacle to the country’s economic and social advancement) and established the Ministry of Local Administration. He also restructured the North Yemen army and raised the salaries of military and civilian personnel.

Under Al-Hamdi's administration, Yemen enjoyed the most prosperous economic boom since 1962, as he was responsible for a civil engineering endeavour that would usher in an era of unprecedented economic growth in Yemen's post-Imamate history. More specifically, Hamdi fostered the creation of 'Local Development Associations,' which functioned as autonomous community-based institutions focused on developing local infrastructure. Scholar Isa Blumi notes that while "Able to exclusively access the potential tax revenue under their jurisdictions, the committees created from members of the community could also solicit external funds and loans (almost exclusively drawn from local, non-banking sources) independently of the central state and bank now formally connected to the outside world." In other words, during the 1970s the LDAs did the heavy lifting as far as the development of Yemen's infrastructure was concerned. What is more, the locally driven LDAs protected the Yemeni countryside from an influx of foreign finance capital (disguised as development 'aid' and often tethered to massive usury rates). The LDA system thus preserved Yemen's economic sovereignty until 1978.

Lieutenant-Colonel Ibrahim al-Hamdi (30 September 1943 – 11 October 1977) (Arabic: إبراهيم الحمدي, romanized: Ibrāhīm al-Ḥamdī) was the leader of a military coup d'etat in the Yemen Arab Republic that overthrew the regime of President Abdul Rahman al-Iryani on 13 June 1974. After the revolt, he was President of the Military Command Council that governed the country. During his rule, he cemented the central government's control over the country, planned on ending tribal loyalty, and Yemen's medieval social classes by proclaiming all Yemenis as equal.