Worldwide Services
Yemen
Report Activities 2019
Report of Activities in 2019
On March 1, 2019, dr.Ton and his wife Anneke arrived back in Holland.
After they worked on Socotra for 9 years, they have retired from their service in Yemen. They first came to Yemen in 1979. Until 1994 they worked in the Republican Hospital in Saadah. They were back in Holland from 1994 until 2002, because of the education of their children. From 2002 until 2009 they served again in Saadah.
From 2010 until 2019 they worked on Socotra, where they provided curative services, health education and training of local staff.
Worldwide Services wants to thank them for their many years of faithful, skillful and cheerful service. Both of them loved the Yemeni people. Well done, Ton and Anneke!
We wish them all the best for this new phase of life, together with their children and grandchildren.
With the departure of Ton and Anneke, Worldwide Services has no workers in Yemen at the moment. However, in various other countries in the Middle East and Africa there are still workers of Worldwide Services working in medical projects of various other NGOs. When the war will cease in Yemen and a phase of rebuilding the medical services will commence, some of these WS workers would like to return to Yemen, to help restore the battered health system.
With this in view, we plan to keep Worldwide Services operational for the foreseeable future.
News
A group of young new midwives, all from Socotra, have just finished their three years training in Mukalla. From the Director of Health of Socotra they all received a complete set of instruments for the purpose of home deliveries.
Yemen is one of the oldest centers of civilization in the Near East. Its capital and largest city is Sana'a. Yemen's territory includes over 200 islands, the largest of which is Socotra, about 354 km (220 mi) to the south of mainland Yemen. It is the only state in the Arabian Peninsula to have a purely republican form of government. Yemen was the first country in the Arabian peninsula to grant women the right to vote. Yemeni unification took place on 22 May 1990, when North Yemen was united with South Yemen, forming the Republic of Yemen.
The majority of Yemen's population is divided into tribal groups, especially in the northern areas of the country where 85% of local residents belong to various tribes. There are also small groups of peoples of Turkish/Ottoman origin in urban areas. Roughly 66% of the population are Sunni Muslims following the Shafi'i school while 34% adhere to the Zaydi Shia branch of Islam with small minorities of Ismali Muslims.
A Shia rebel movement, the Houthis, emerged in the early 2000s, claiming it would fight against what it saw as the marginalization of the Shi’ites of the Zaydi sect, which prevails in the Yemeni highlands.