Govt Named In Aden

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31542, 2 December 1967, Page 13

Govt Named In Aden

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright?

ADEN, Dec. 1.

President Qahtan Mohammed Al-Shaabi formed an 11-man Government today with himself as Prime Minister to rule the one - day - old People’s Republic of South Yemen.

Mr Al-Shaabi, aged 47, announced the names of his Government after an all-night meeting of leaders of the National Liberation Front, which will be the only political organisation in the country. He will also be Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces.

Seif Ahmed Al Dhalaie, one of the members of the sevenman N.L.F. team which Mr Al-Shaabi led at the Geneva independence talks with Britain, was named Foreign Minister. Two other members of the independence talks team— Feisal Abdul Latif Al-Shaabi (economy, commerce and planning), and Abdul Fattah Ismail Al Jaufi (culture, national guidance and Yemen unity) are in the Government.

Adel Mahfoudh Khalifa, a British-educated lawyer who was legal adviser to the delegation, was given the justice

and religious affairs portfolios. Mr Al-Shaabi was named President by the N.L.F. General Command yesterday as the country’s 1,500,000 Arabs celebrated their first day of independence after 128 years of British rule. Cheering Arabs at a huge rally in the former federal capital of Al Ittihad, 10 miles west of Aden, greeted the announcement with chants of “Oh Qahtan, we are your soldiers,” and “Nasser, Nasser.”

Arab troops were hard pressed to hold back the crowd as they tried to surge round Mr Al-Shaabi, who only a few hours earlier had returned from independence talks with Britain at Geneva. Mr Al-Shaabi said the Republic would join the Arab League and the United Nations and follow a nonaligned policy. One of the toughest tasks facing the country’s new rulers is organising the economy.

Britain has promised about £lO million in aid over the next six months.

The N.L.F. asked for £lOO million over five years but no decision was reached at Geneva and further talks are to be held at a later date. In New York yesterday the United Nations General Assembly wished peace and prosperity to the People’s Republic of South Yemen and hoped that it would overcome problems created as a “consequence of colonial rule/