DOHA, Qatar (IPS/Al Jazeera) — Yemeni President Ali Abdullah
Saleh’s departure for medical treatment in Saudi Arabia leaves something of a
power vacuum in the country, which has been ruled by one man for decades.

An anti-government protester shouts slogans during a demonstration calling for an interim presidential council to prevent embattled president Ali Abdullah Saleh from returning to power, in Sanaa June 9, 2011. REUTERS/Ammar Awad

Tareq al-Shami, a senior member of the ruling General
People’s Congress, said on Sunday that Saleh would return from Saudi Arabia
“within days.” But a number of political actors will surely vie for
power in Saleh’s absence — and after his potential return.

Tens of thousands of people remain on the streets of Sanaa
and other cities, the same men and women who have spent months demonstrating —
often braving tear gas, snipers and armed thugs. They have pledged to remain,
with leaders of the movement describing Saleh’s departure as a first step and
promising to push for further democratic reforms.

But complicating that goal is the handful of political
players who see Saleh’s absence as a chance to seize more power.

Government sources in Yemen said on Sunday that Saleh’s sons
and nephews have not left the country. That gives Saleh a strong power base
inside Yemen; the president has spent years consolidating power within his
family.

The elite Republican Guard is headed by Saleh’s son, Ahmed,
long viewed as a potential heir to the presidency. His nephew Yahya leads the
riot police; another nephew, Tariq, is the head of Saleh’s personal bodyguards.

Several other brothers and nephews hold key positions in the
military and intelligence services as well. Collectively, Saleh’s family
commands tens of thousands of troops, many of them the best-trained and
best-equipped in Yemen.

Saleh’s relatives have kept a low profile since his
departure; none of them have issued public statements.

The Ahmar family

The sons of Abdullah al-Ahmar, the former leader of the
Hashid tribal confederation, constitute one of the strongest political forces
in the country.

Hamid al-Ahmar has long been considered a potential
successor to Saleh. He is one of the most powerful businessmen in the country,
with a controlling stake in the Sabafone mobile phone network and a number of
other companies. One of his brothers, Himyar, is the deputy speaker of
parliament; another, Hussein, is a leader of the Hashid.

Fighting between Saleh’s forces and tribesmen loyal to the
Ahmars has paralyzed the Yemeni capital for weeks. Saleh’s men shelled the Ahmar
compound in Sanaa last month; al-Ahmar’s men have been blamed for the rocket
attack against the presidential palace this week, though the government has not
proved that allegation.

That fighting could well continue in the post-Saleh era.
Analysts say the Ahmar family needs to be included in talks about Yemen’s
future, and that an uncoordinated transition — a power vacuum — would lead to
prolonged fighting between the Ahmars and the Salehs.

“What happens now depends under what condition he’s
leaving. If it’s with no arrangement or settlement, then [Saleh’s] son and
nephews will take over, and they will be fighting directly with the sons of
Ahmar,” said Ali Seif Hassan, a political analyst in Sanaa. “It will
be war.”

General Ali Mohsen

Another wild card is General Ali Mohsen, the head of Yemen’s
first armored division, the largest branch of the regular Yemeni army. A 2005
U.S. embassy cable, released by WikiLeaks, described him as the “most
powerful military man in the land.”

He defected in March, ordering troops under his command to
protect peaceful protesters in Sanaa and elsewhere, and his men have clashed on
numerous occasions with forces loyal to Saleh. Those clashes seem to be ongoing.
Two people were killed on Sunday, and more than a dozen injured, in a grenade
attack on a building used by Mohsen’s troops (no one has yet claimed
responsibility, though).

Mohsen was once a close ally of Saleh’s (and he is also the
president’s half-brother), but relations between the two men chilled in recent
years. In part, that’s because of Mohsen’s political ambitions; he felt
overshadowed by Saleh’s son and heir apparent, Ahmed.

More recently, Saleh tried to have the general killed. He
asked Saudi Arabia to bomb a compound in northern Yemen where Mohsen was; the
Saudis “sensed something was wrong about the information,” according
to another leaked U.S. cable, and did not carry out the bombing raid.

Mohsen has said publicly that he does not want to be
president, but he is also known to be politically ambitious.

Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi

Yemen’s vice president for the last 17 years, Abd-Rabbu
Mansour Hadi, was elevated to the presidency after Saleh left the country —
through Yemeni officials insist this is a short-term measure. (Yemen’s
constitution allows the vice president to take over for 60 days if the
president is “absent”.)

Hadi was appointed vice president in 1994, at the end of
Yemen’s civil war. He was born in Abyan province in southern Yemen, so his
appointment was something of a concession to southerners following the civil
war — but a canny one, since Hadi was viewed as a weak figure in Yemeni
politics.

Most of his career was spent in the military, including a
stint as minister of defense.

Hadi has kept a low profile since the uprising began. A deal
negotiated by Gulf Cooperation Council states — which Saleh refused to sign on
three separate occasions — would have installed him as president after Saleh’s
departure.

But it is unclear whether the newly-elevated vice president
has any desire to keep the presidency.

“Hadi has been a background player since he was named
[vice president], while Saleh’s family and clan continued to gobble up the
headlines and positions,” said Gregory Johnsen, a Yemen scholar at
Princeton University. “But power has been known to dazzle most who draw
near.”

The political opposition

Then there is Yemen’s official political opposition, which
has played at best a limited role in the events of the last few months.

Most of Yemen’s opposition parties are united under the
banner of the Joint Meeting Parties (JMP), an eclectic coalition of Islamists,
socialists and tribal elements. The JMP spent weeks trying to broker Saleh’s
exit; last month, it signed the GCC deal.

But that signature put them at odds with the protesters on
Yemen’s streets, who were angry at the deal’s promise of immunity and its 30-
day window for Saleh to step down.

The JMP has historically been a disorganized party, and it
has few recognizable leaders; the internal dysfunction means it is unlikely to
gain any significant power in a post-Saleh Yemen.