Unknown fate for the billions of dollars donated to Yemen

Two months after the last conference of donors to support Yemen, questions are increasing about the fate of this money, which is often heard noise in the media, but we do not find it has any tangible impact, on reality, or on people's lives
 
The last conference, held on the second of June 2020, ended its work by collecting $ 1.350 billion to support the United Nations response plan for the year 2020 in Yemen, without meeting the target amount of $2.4 billion needed by the United Nations to save the largest aid operation in the world from being a sharp cut
 
More than 126 parties participated in the conference, including 66 countries, 15 international organizations, 3 intergovernmental organizations, and 39 non-governmental organizations, in addition to the Islamic Development Bank, the International Committee of the Red Cross
The most prominent contributions came from Saudi Arabia providing $ 500 million, Norway $ 195 million, UK $ 200 million, Sweden $ 30 million, Japan $ 41 million to Yemeni relief institutions, $ 7.3 million to counter the Coronavirus, South Korea $ 18.4 million, and Canada $ 40 million, while the European Commission provided $ 80 million, and the Netherlands $ 16.7 million
 
Economists consider that the donors' conference is not different from the previous ones, as Yemenis only hear them through the media, but no presence on the ground
 
They emphasized that the Yemenis will not benefit from donor pledges, because unknown parties receive and share money and use the suffering and pain of the people as a humanitarian gesture, through which the United Nations organizations attract a lot of support
 
They pointed out that since the beginning of the war and with the experience of the past five years, these conferences will have no effect, as 50% of these pledges go, such as operating expenses, salaries and petty cash for employees of international organizations, and the rest of them go to the Houthi militia, by virtue of the fact that the offices of these organizations are in their areas of control. Adding that international organizations movements and activities require the issuance of permits by the Houthi militia, while some influential people in the Hadi government receive a part of this money
 
Economists believe that these international aid and donations have not found much benefit in times of peace, and will not be the same in light of war, while most of these pledges go as an operational expense for international and local organizations, and what reaches the citizen hardly meets his living and food needs
 
Economists demanded that a new mechanism be provided to absorb donor pledges and employ those funds in a correct manner that directly supports the national economy, and to deposit those funds to the central bank,
which would have a positive impact in improving the cash reserve of foreign currencies, in addition to improving exchange rates, goods and essential food