Al Jazeera Net - Sanaa
Amid the rusty structures of buses and cars randomly distributed near a sewage bank in central Sanaa bodies have accumulated made "scrap" a trap for them to meet the cold nights of the capital, where the temperature drops to three degrees Celsius.
The garbage collector, Abdullah Saeed, leaves one of the old buses at 7:00 am at his work place in the cleaning and improvement fund (Hukoomi). Two hours later, his children start to hear the sound of car horns passing by their "house".
The rest of the car and bus structures covered with plastic tarpaulins have another life. Umm Mustafa's family has three cars and a toilet in one of the nearby houses, making it in a distinct position from the rest of the families.
| A tent for a family of displaced persons in Sana'a Street (Al Jazeera Net) |
This is our life
In the vicinity of these cars, tents were erected, which soon turned into small rooms. In front of them, men often sat down in the evening to eat khat sticks (a warning plant that the drug users call them to be active and vital).
"This is our life, we sleep in the street and eat what others have to offer us, a hard and tiring life, but it is not in our hands, we may be better off than others," says Said, who collects his children's food from a restaurant to remove the garbage.
"I do not have the money to live in a room and a bathroom of no more than two meters for at least ten thousand riyals ($ 20) a month. Here I live freely, in the winter season we get hurt, but we endure."
Growing homeless
The war in Yemen has led to the collapse of humanitarian and economic conditions and has made thousands of Yemenis homeless, sleeping on sidewalks and roads.
The displacement to the capital, Sana'a, which has a relative security situation, has also aggravated the number of homeless people taking the walls of government buildings to sleep, but the arrival of winter may affect many of them.
Ammar Dawood, a young man active in a local youth initiative, is trying to redouble his efforts with others to collect as many blankets as possible, to recycle, wash and distribute them to the displaced, and is thinking of using international organizations.
"Every day the circle of poverty increases and the number of displaced people increases, including psychiatric patients, unemployed workers and displaced people from other cities, and in the end they are human beings, and we are trying to help them survive, especially in the winter."
There is no official figure or count of the number of displaced persons, but David - who launched his initiative a few days ago under the name of the winter coat - says to the island that they are hundreds.
| Tents that soon turned into days to small rooms to accommodate homeless (Al Jazeera Net) |
They are begging
The streets of Sanaa walk on the fleet with its dirty name and bag it carries on its back, where "Glast slept", meaning when it is time to sleep brushing the blanket that carries and sleep on any sidewalk.
"I am poor and I live on the charity of the people. I do not have family members in the village. They are self-sufficient and they live on begging like me."
Al-Asey recounts his suffering with homelessness. He tells Al-Jazeera Net that he fled with his family after the fighting started on the outskirts of Hodeidah in mid-2008, when he decided to move with his family to the capital Sana'a.
"In Sanaa, the situation is different, life is harsh, and with the cold, my family decided to go back to our village in the governorate of Mahweet, west of Sanaa."
"There are important documents and documents that still remind me that I am still alive. The days may be the same as before, the war stops, and I go back to a factory guard, who knows?" He said. .
| Mattress on the wheels (Al Jazeera Net) |
Powerless powers
In the face of growing homelessness, local authorities in the capital Sanaa say they are trying to find solutions for the displaced, while international and local organizations are seeking to shelter the largest number of displaced people who have proof of their displacement from their homes.
According to Ismail al-Kubsi, an official at the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor, government authorities are unable to bear this heavy burden because of the continued aggression to destroy the Yemenis and impose a suffocating siege on Yemen four years ago.
The war in the western city of Hodeidah displaced more than 30,000 families to Sanaa, a source in the National Authority for the Administration and Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Huthi) said.
A report by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Yemen said last week that 80,000 and 763 families had been displaced from Hodeidah province, which has been the scene of violent clashes between government forces and Houthis since June.
The areas targeted by the displaced included several provinces, including the capital Sana'a, and other safe areas in Hodeidah.