Yemeni Prime Minister Khaled Bahah on Wednesday suggested that his government could resign, expressing exasperation after Houthi rebels who control the capital Sanaa raided state institutions and sacked public officials.
The Houthis, also known as Ansarullah, became the de facto power in Yemen when they captured Sanaa in September.
On Wednesday, they evicted a state oil company director and his deputy from their offices and stopped the manager of one of the main sea ports, tightening the group's grip on state institutions.
Yemeni state news agency Saba reported Bahah as telling his weekly cabinet meeting that the government was ready to "withdraw if the other party was willing to shoulder the responsibility," apparently referring to the Houthis.
Bahah said he would not countenance bloodshed and could not tolerate "any project other than the constitutional and judicial project to administer the state," Saba reported.
In mid-October President Abed-Rabbo Mansour Hadi appointed Bahah, who was at that time the country's envoy to the United Nations, as prime minister in a move welcomed by Houthis.
Bahah had served previously as oil minister. His appointment as a prime minister came under a power-sharing deal signed last month by the Houthis and other major political parties at Hadi's presidential palace. The deal aims to bring the Houthis and the wing of a separatist group into a more inclusive government.
Houthi leader Abdel-Malek al-Houthi on Tuesday accused Hadi of allowing corruption, and demanded he hand control of state bodies to the Houthis so they could ensure that "funds are not wasted."
Although officials claim Houthis are getting support from former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, the rebel group portray their movement as a revolution against corruption and embezzlement which is emptying state coffers.
Armed Houthis on Wednesday prevented the director of Hodeida port, Yemen's main Red Sea harbor where most of the country's food imports arrive, from reaching his office with a view to replacing him, port officials said.
Separately, about 20 Houthi fighters broke into the state-run Safer oil company in Sanaa, kicked out the director and his deputy and locked their offices, company officials said.
The Houthis had already sacked four provincial governors, the editor of the main state newspaper, Al-Thawra, and the commander of the special forces.
On Tuesday, Saleh loyalists held up a parliamentary meeting which was meant to confirm Bahah's government, demanding the reopening of offices belonging to their General People's Congress which they said had been shut by authorities in southern Yemen.
On December 8, Hadi fired his armed forces chief of staff, Ahmad Ali al-Ashouel, who moved under a presidential decree to the Majlis al-Shura (consultative council), the lower chamber of parliament.
No reason was given for Hadi sacking Ashouel, but it came with the impoverished Arabian Peninsula state embroiled in political and military chaos and Ansarullah delaying a pullback it agreed to under a UN-brokered accord in September.
Apart from Houthis and Saleh loyalists, Bahah’s government faces an al-Qaeda threat in the south and eastern part of the country and a challenge from southern separatists who have been calling for a weekly civil disobedience day every Monday to demand independence.
Since a 2011 uprising forced Saleh to step down in 2012, the country has been struggling with widespread and growing instability, alarming neighboring Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil exporter, and other Gulf Arab states.
