South Yemen New Thinking in a Marxist Land

By MURRAY J. GART/ADEN

Here the Queen of Sheba once ruled. Here the Magi bought frankincense and myrrh. Here Arabian trade routes crisscrossed, bringing exotic spices, precious cloths and treasures from the East. Here too in 1967 devout Marxists won independence for their moonscape land at the mouth of the Red Sea. After 128 years of British colonial rule, they were determined to use the precepts of socialist orthodoxy to yank a remote Arab nation into the 20th century. The People's Democratic Republic of Yemen, or simply South Yemen, set up a Moscow- style government and forged close ties with its mentor.

For most of South Yemen's 2.3 million Muslims, the 21-year experiment with strict Marxism was not a success. The country's zealously ideological rulers sketched a brief history of war and intrigue against three conservative Arabian peninsula neighbors and dissipated their power in vicious infighting among tribal and political factions at home. Between 1967 and 1986 the top party leadership changed five times, each regime more radical than the last. For its unflinching march down the socialist road, South Yemen won high ranking among the poorest nations on earth.

Today the orthodox P.D.R.Y. is embracing a modest version of perestroika. By local standards the reforms are radical: encouraging private farms, welcoming Western investment and reorganizing state-run industry. In the capital of Aden, the latest ruling Politburo has called the country's Central Committee into session to adopt such bold measures as more funding for private and cooperative farms and better pay to spur greater productivity among state farm workers.

The signal for change came in a hail of machine gunfire inside party headquarters in 1986, when one party chief rubbed out four of his leading Politburo opponents. For 15 days South Yemen blazed with a Communist Party civil war, even forcing most of the country's 5,000 Soviet advisers and their dependents to flee. When it was all over, 5,000 Yemenis lay dead, $500 million worth of Soviet military hardware had been destroyed, and some 65,000 men had fled to North Yemen.

Moscow chose as the new Secretary-General of the Yemen Socialist Party Ali Salem al Beedh, a Politburo member who was wounded in the abortive coup. He is pressing a drive initiated last year to improve South Yemen's long-troubled relations with its neighbors. He wants to end ruptures with Oman and Saudi Arabia, and especially to advance on-again off-again efforts to merge with North Yemen. Al Beedh is planning an early resumption of relations with the U.S., broken in 1969.

Another of South Yemen's leaders, President Haidar Abu Bakr al Attas, who ranks No. 3 in the leadership hierarchy, candidly admits his country's "mistakes in the past" of trying to export socialist revolution and says, "We are not exporters of our ideas. We are here for one purpose, to develop our country so that we can improve the lives of our people."

Not for a generation have such moderate noises emanated from Aden. For ten years South Yemen has topped the State Department's list of countries that support terrorism. Aden kept an open door to leftist revolutionaries, including terrorists such as Japan's Red Army and West Germany's Baader- Meinhof Gang, who were supported with camps and special training.

The new regime considers itself a victim of terrorism in the shoot-out of ( 1986, so it has written new rules. According to Foreign Minister Abdul Aziz Ad-dali, it now strictly adheres to United Nations terrorism standards. "Revolutionaries like members of the P.L.O. or the African National Congress are welcome," he said, "but you will not find one terrorist here."

South Yemen wants to forge a political and economic union with North Yemen, its bigger, more conservative and Western-oriented neighbor. Al Attas regards the merger as his country's "crucial" issue. "We are all Yemenis," he says. "We find it very important to raise the level of cooperation between our two countries." To that end, a newfound oil concession near the North Yemen border has been earmarked for joint development. The border is now open, plans for a combined power grid have been drawn, and a fresh draft of a unified constitution is almost ready for ratification. But past relations have been so rocky that skeptics doubt that the grandiose dreams of one Yemen nation can be realized. "I can't see how the north and this socialist government can ever be put together," says one veteran Western diplomat in Aden.

Oil is the grease not just for diplomatic outreach but for South Yemen's attempts at bootstrap development. In 1987 Soviet geologists discovered a little of the black gold beneath the desert sands near Shabwa. When the first wells begin gushing in 1990, the area may produce up to 70,000 barrels a day. That small but steady output will bring $240 million a year into South Yemen's treasury.

The Soviets' major practical contribution has been prospecting for and developing oil. Eight Russian rigs are drilling in Shabwa, and the Soviets are searching out more untapped desert pools. Now the Yemeni government is urging Moscow to speed up other large projects long promised. The Kremlin has been slow to finish a $450 million power plant begun eleven years ago. But after a row in Aden last June, trained Soviet labor began arriving, bringing the imported contingent of skilled workers to more than 2,000.

The Yemenis are also cautiously looking West for more help. Canadian and French oil companies have signed contracts for oil exploration and drilling. And for the first time since British rule ended, Western businessmen are again traveling to Aden to invest in the government's ambitious plans.

Still, South Yemen remains firmly in the Soviet orbit. Aden's strategic location gives the Soviet navy a deep-water port with excellent facilities to service its large Indian Ocean fleet. From there, Soviet ships could control access in or out of the Red Sea, a choke point of global importance. South Yemen refuses to accord the U.S.S.R. full base rights for its navy, and is rumored to restrict port calls by Soviet warships to twelve a year. But bunkering and repair services are always available.

Little has changed as yet in this impoverished land. Around Aden, a busy port where several thousand ships call each year, swarm laborers clad in sarongs and tribal headgear. The nation comes close to feeding itself but its searing bone-dry desert climate offers little room for agricultural expansion. Except for a 1950s Chinese-built textile mill and an old refinery, there is little manufacturing. Much of the country is pitifully underemployed.

One of the most popular pastimes is chewing kat, small leaves from a mildly narcotic and addictive plant. Strict laws forbid the sale except on two-day weekends of the so-called Yemeni vodka, which has a disastrous effect on productivity. Women are free from most Islamic restrictions, able to choose the chador or the dress. In fact, the country adheres little to either Muslim or Marxist strictures. Liquor is sold, and the Communist Party numbers only 20,000 members.

Having marched relentlessly down the radical road, which earned little more than a broken-down economy and an ugly international reputation, South Yemen seems ready to try another direction. How far it will go, and how successfully, depends on untested talents. The old hands in South Yemen always wonder when the next coup will dash their frail hopes.