SANA’A, Jan. 22—Following a speech from President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi on Tuesday expressing his optimism in Yemen’s future after the National Dialogue Conference (NDC) officially ends this Saturday, a Houthis’ spokesperson at the conference said on Wednesday that his political party does not stand behind the NDC’s final document, possibly signaling a bumpy road ahead as Yemen’s transition continues.  

The NDC’s outcomes, outlined in the Solutions and Guarantees Document, extend Hadi’s term for a year and officially set Yemen on the path to become a federal state. The document also stipulates that Yemen’s Cabinet, comprised of ministers, be restructured.  However, Parliament will remain as is until a new constitution is drafted. Elections will be held at future, unannounced dates. The Shura Council, an advisory board for Parliament will be reorganized to include 50 percent representation from Northerners and 50 percent from Southerners.     

At the NDC’s concluding plenary session on Tuesday, the president said the Houthis—a group of Zaidi Shiites who established their own political party following Yemen’s popular uprising in 2011—had sent a signed letter expressing their support of the solutions document. The letter was only referenced never released.  

“We believe the document aims to extend the term of the current, failed government and security institutions. Even if the NDC’s outcomes were positive, they would fail because they rest on failed institutions,” said  Houthi spokesperson Ali Al-Bukhaiti.

Al-Bukhaiti refutes the letter Hadi references. The Houthis left the plenary session before it concluded after receiving news that their fellow representative Dr. Ahmed Sharaf Al-Deen had been assassinated on his way to the session.

Sharaf Al-Deen was one of 20 members of the Guarantees Committee at the NDC. The committee was the group in charge of drafting the final documents.   

While Al-Bukhaiti denies that Sharaf Al-Deen had signed the document before his death, Abdulmalik Al-Mekhlafi, the head of the Guarantees Committee, said on Tuesday that all members had signed off on it.

 “Sharaf Al-Deen worked for the success of the NDC, and to honor him we should work hard to make it successful,” Al-Mekhlafi said.

Al-Bukhaiti said the Houthis will not be attending any future NDC meetings, including the closing ceremony on Saturday unless the government promises protection for their representatives.