Over the last ten days, over 32 incidents of shooting were reported. Most Yemeni cities sleep under the sound of gunfire every night. A Western ambassador in Sanaa stated that the authorities have lost control over the situation in the country. He added that individuals and groups regularly engage in various violent confrontations leading to armed killings every day. The authorities routinely turn a blind eye to these killings, provided they do not affect the power division in the country.
People often take the law into their own hands to settle differences.
Therefore, individual and group showdowns became a recurrent phenomenon involving guns, kalashnikovs, bazookas and other light arms. The main loser from these developments has been the middle class. They also move around town only with hordes of bodyguards - either officially sanctioned or otherwise. The penniless poor and low-income individuals offer little incentive to be targeted by armed marauders. They are the ones who suffer from different forms of intimidation, blackmail and harassment by armed thugs.