Aden: Yemeni President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi has retracted his resignation after escaping house arrest in the militia-controlled capital, an aide said on Tuesday.
The embattled leader had tendered his resignation last month after the Al Houthi group seized the presidential palace and besieged his residence in Sana’a.
On Saturday he made a surprise escape and resurfaced in Aden, the capital of the formerly independent south Yemen, where he resumed his duties and said all measures taken by Al Houthis were “null and illegitimate”.
An aide to Hadi said he had sent a letter withdrawing the resignation to Yemen’s parliament, which had never met to formally accept it.
“I have withdrawn my resignation which I tendered to your esteemed parliament,” Hadi wrote in the letter.
In the letter, Hadi urged lawmakers to cooperate with him to “salvage the salvageable and to normalise the security and economic situation in all provinces”.
Hadi also called on government ministers to “head immediately to Aden to convene,” the presidential aide said.
Prime Minister Khalid Bahah had tendered his resignation at the same time as Hadi. He remains under house arrest in Sana’a along with other ministers and officials.
Al Houthis, whose power base is in the mainly Shiite northern highlands, overran Sana’a unopposed in September.
They have pushed their advance south and west, where they have met with fierce resistance from tribesmen and Yemen’s powerful branch of Al Qaida.
Hadi is a southerner who spent nearly three decades in the north, serving as defence minister and vice president. He became president in 2012 after longtime strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh was forced from power by a year-long uprising.
