Category News

Discussion Panel on Diversity at KSU

What: Diversity in the Saudi Society
Who: Khalil al-Khalil and Abdullah Dahlan
When: Saturday, January 10, 2009. 10:30 AM
Where: Building No.7, Auditorium 7A
RSVP: Attending

In a conservative, conformist society like ours, diversity is not a popular term. Its opponents have always tried to make diversity look like a threat to national unity. That’s total bull, of course. Because our diversity only makes us stronger.

Hopefully this and other interesting ideas will be tackled in this discussion panel hosted by the Literary Club at KSU next Saturday. The speakers are Khalil al-Khalil and Abdullah Dahlan, both members of the dead Shoura Council. It is an open event and everyone is encouraged to come. The discussion panel will also be broadcast live to Khadija Bin Khuwailed auditorium in Olayisha campus for girls.

Boring Drama, Happy Endings

Cinema is back to Saudi Arabia… sort of.

Rotana, the entertainment group owned by the country’s richest man Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, premiered the comedy Menahi in Jeddah and Taif… but not in Riyadh. It was obvious that Rotana were trying to avoid a confrontation with the the Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice aka the religious police. The Commission are much more powerful in Riyadh than they are in Jeddah and other places.

Still, it was obvious from the statements by Ayman Halwani, GM of Rotana, that they wanted to keep a low profile. They were wary of drawing too much attention to the screenings: “We’re worried that some of the conservatives might try to filibuster the opening,” he said. Have you ever heard of a movie producer who does not want his work to get much attention? Well, that’s Saudi Arabia for you, a country so full of contradictions it will make your head go dizzy.

Nevertheless, and despite the precautions taken by Rotana, the Commission unequivocally denounced the screenings. Sheikh Ibrahim al-Ghaith, head of the religious police told the press: “cinema is evil and we do not need it. We have enough evil already.” But one day later, al-Ghaith changed his tone on the subject. “We are not against having cinema if it shows the good and does not violate Islamic law,” he said. Now some people in the local media praised him for having the courage to take a U-turn, but many believe that he changed his line after a call from a senior royal.

In any case, his flip-floping did not seem to undermine the overwhelming enthusiasm of moviegoers who filled the theaters in Jeddah and Taif throughout the Eid holiday. The shows were all sold out and Rotana said they plan to produce 3 Saudi films this year.

So what does this mean to the country? Khalid al-Dakhil, former political sociology professor at KSU, thinks it is a giant step for the Saudi society. “(It shows) the erosion of the religious establishment’s influence, who realized they have to concede,” he told Reuters. I’m not sure that I agree with him on describing this step as “giant” but it certainly indicates the changes taking place in the country. Will 2009 see the official opening of the first proper movie theater in Saudi Arabia? I won’t bet on it, not just because betting is illegal here, but also because living in this place teaches you not to hold your breath when it comes to change.

Cinema, like women’s driving and other issues that we have been discussing for years now, has become a long, boring drama. Let’s just hope we will be graced by some happy endings.

Taking to Streets in Saudi Arabia

On the 19th of December, a few hundred people demonstrated in Qatif, a predominantly Shiite area east of Saudi Arabia, to protest the Israeli siege on Gaza. The protesters lifted posters of Hizbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasarallah and chanted anti-Israeli and anti-US slogans. According to the website Rasid, the demonstration ended peacefully under the eyes of security forces who watched closely. However, tens of young men who demonstrated were arrested in the following week.

After Israel started their barbarian attack on Gaza last Saturday, thousands of angry demonstrators took to the streets in Egypt, Jordan, Yemen and other countries. In Saudi Arabia, where the law does not give people the right to demonstrate publicly, more than 60 political and human rights activists signed a letter to the Ministry of Interior asking for permission to hold a peaceful demonstration in Riyadh.

While activists in Riyadh were waiting for a reply from MOI, protesters in Qatif demonstrated again on Monday, but this time they were faced by the security forces and riot police who fired rubber bullets to break up the protest. Mansour al-Turki, spokesman of MOI, denied that such protest took place. “Street protests are banned in the Kingdom and that the security forces will intervene to enforce the ban,” he added. His denial is not surprising, but everyone knows that people of Qatif have a long history in street protests with major demonstrations held in 1979, 2002 and 2006.

Four activists who signed the letter were summoned to meet a senior official at MOI today who also said the country’s regulations do not allow such activities. The activists said nothing in the local laws bans street protests but they signed a pledge that they will not hold the demonstration which was planned to take place tomorrow in Nahda Street. Another activist who did not sign the letter said he does not need a permission from anyone to protest. Khalid al-Umair said that he and other activists will be there tomorrow “because we are simply exercising our natural right in expressing our opinion peacefully.”

This was the first time for a group of activists to ask for such permission, and it was expected that MOI would not give a positive response. Although the request was denied, it seemed to encourage more people to take similar steps. More than 200 students at King Abdul-Aziz University in Jeddah sent a letter today to the rector asking for permission to hold a demonstration but he refused saying the university is not the right place to protest.

People should be allowed to protest, but it seems that the government is afraid that people will realize the power of public demonstration and later use it not just to protest against Israel but also to demand their rights. Giving permission to these demonstrations would set a precedent that the government clearly doesn’t want to deal with its results and consequences. 2009 will be interesting.

UPDATE: Khalid al-Umair and Mohammed Abdullah al-Otaibi have been arrested Thursday noon.

Also read:

Court of Embarrassment

Not so long ago, criticizing the judiciary was a taboo in this country. But with more people learning more about their rights and finding new outlets to express their dissatisfaction, they began to clearly show their impatience with the performance of the justice system. The system has become a battlefield between reformers who demanded change and conservatives who defended the judges fiercely, arguing that since their verdicts are based on Sharia then they should be unquestionable.

Luckily for the rest of us though, the complaints did not fall on deaf ears. In October 2007, King Abdullah announced a $2bn plan to overhaul the legal system. It is a large undertaking and it will certainly take a long time to see the effects of this plan. The resistance of the old guard in the system will only make this process slower and more difficult. But one of the good immediate effects of this plan is that it has placed the judges under increased scrutiny. The past two years have witnessed a number of high profile cases that attracted much attention from people and the media, not just in Saudi Arabia but around the world.

I think that last week’s case in Onaiza, where a court rejected a divorce petition filed by the mother of a an eight-year-old girl whose father married her to a 58-year-old man, should be seen in that context. Sure, the verdict is outrageous and unfair, but hey, this is the K of SA, a country where judges are not tied to written laws and justice is a subjective matter that pretty much depends on their whims. Does Sheikh Habib al-Habib know that his government has singed the international Convention on the Rights of the Child since 1996? I don’t think he does, and I think he does not care because such international laws are made by mere mortals while he probably believes that he is applying God’s laws.

Abdullah Al-Jutaili, the lawyer representing the girl’s divorced mother, said he was going to appeal the verdict. Let’s hope judges at the appeals court will be wiser than their colleague here when they deal with this case that not only exemplified the kind of injustices the people of this country have to go through when their misfortunate leads them to a court, but also further tarnished the already distorted image of Saudi Arabia in the world.

Google Introduces Hijri Calendar

Dates, not that kind of dates and not the ones you can eat, can be confusing in Saudi Arabia because we use two calendars: the Hijri and the Gregorian. Since our country boasts itself as the bastion of Islam, the official calendar used by the government is the Hijri calendar. But since the Hijri calendar is lunar and the religious establishment here refuses to accept any other mean of moon sighting except the naked eye, this has led to some unpredictability and controversy over the years, especially when it comes to announcing the start of Ramadhan, Eid or Hajj.

Writer Mohammed Hasan Alwan captured this duality in his latest novel, where one of the characters complained: “That’s what makes time passing heavier on us, to live in a country that uses two calendars to audit its accounts. Why? A Hiri year, and a Gregorian year, and the year ends twice, and life ends twice.” The new Hijri calendar introduced by Google might not solve the problem of Mohammed Hasan Alwan’s character, but it should help the rest of us to avoid some confusion when it comes to organizing our life around two calendars. You can enable the Hijri calendar by going to the calendar settings and select the desired calendar from the drop down box next to “Alternate calendar”.

Rants from Beirut

Sorry about the hiatus. I’m back in town after a few days in Beirut, and No, I wasn’t there to enjoy the Eid break. I was invited by the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) to participate at the 3rd Arab Free Press Forum. I was a speaker at last year’s event and I had a good time there. This year, my friend Fouad al-Farhan was invited to speak on a discussion panel on the changing face of Arab blogging. Unfortunately, Fouad was stopped at Jeddah airport and was told that he is banned from leaving the country.

I was in Riyadh airport preparing to take my plane to Beirut when I received the disturbing news which made me upset. What happened to Fouad reminded me with other good people in this country also banned from traveling despite what they have contributed to this nation. People who sacrificed their freedom to promote free speech, human rights and justice. It is truly sad that such people are treated this way, especially in these times that carried the signs of reform and hope for a better future.

However, Saudi Arabia was not alone in this shameful act. Syria and Tunisia followed suit by banning two journalists and a human rights activist from traveling to attend the event. In his opening remarks, Timothy Balding, CEO of WAN, thanked the authorities of Tunisia, Saudi Arabia and Syria for this eloquent and timely demonstration of their contempt for, and fear of, free expression. Of course this is not surprising. According to the latest Annual Worldwide Press Freedom Index released by RSF, the three countries ranked 143, 161 and 159 out of 173.

Now coming to the forum’s sessions, the first one dealt with new tactics used by governments and the judiciary to impede and sanction the independent press. In his introduction, the moderator described these new tactics as oblique or subtle. But Ibrahim Essa, editor-in-chief of Al Dastour daily in Egypt refused such description, saying the Arab governments are not cleaver enough to employ such tactics. “I think Arab governments are stupid and repressive and they don’t need to resort to oblique tactics. Our governments don’t need to resort to oblique tactics because they are blunt,” he added.

The second session, on which Fouad was supposed to speak, focused on the Arab blogging scene. Interestingly, and maybe not surprisingly, the three presenters are all living and writing from outside their countries. Syrian blogger Mohammed al-Abdullah talked about restrictions on the internet in his country and the evolution of the Syrian blogosphere. He said the bloggers have become a source of information for Syrian citizens, despite all the constraints and obstacles for even just being on the internet. Mohammed left Syria after being arrested twice and facing a third arrest (his father and brother are both in jail).

Sami Ben Gharbia, as usual, was awesome. He talked about Tunisia’s sophisticated internet blocking apparatus, and how bloggers and activists have used Web 2.0 technologies to find and use innovative ways around the system.

But I have to say that it was Kizzie Shawkat, the blogger from Sudan, that I felt I could relate to her story the most. Kizzie started blogging because she had no venue to express her opinion, but quickly found herself in a role where she was providing a view of her country from a different perspective from official sources. I agree with her that blogging has become an important forum for social activism, and I think this could lead the way for other kinds of activism in the future. “You have to allow people to express themselves and we’re not used to doing that,” she concluded.

While the third discussion panel of the day that addressed editorial policies, trends and innovations in Arab newsrooms was not particularly interesting to me, the first day of the conference ended with much drama as four Tunisian government officials interrupted the presentation of a new report by the Tunisia Monitoring Group about the lack of freedom in Tunisia. The Tunisian officials broke into a shouting match with the speakers and other attendees who found themselves quite amused by those officials who shamelessly embarrassed themselves.

The second day of the conference had only one panel which discussed the business of newspaper publishing in the Arab World. Later on the day, we witnessed the ceremony of the Gebran Tueni Award. This year’s prize was handed out to Ibrahim Essa, who was recently pardoned by his country’s president, but still facing 32 lawsuits.

Away from the conference, and although Fouad’s travel ban left a dark shadow on the trip, it was as always good to be back to Beirut and meet friends and fellow bloggers. The city was filled with tourists and visitors, many of them Saudis, but I avoided hanging out in their favourite spots. I want to thank my friend Buthaina for taking me to the Comedy Night show, where Mario Bassil and his colleagues entertained us for more than 2 hours and made fun of almost every single Lebanese politician. I want also to thank my friend Alex for the good times, especially at Club Sociale in Gemayzie where we enjoyed a lovely performances by Hiba Mansouri and Zeid Hamdan aka shift Z.

Finally, I want to leave you with this interesting column (Arabic) by Yahia al-Ameer. He argues that what makes Beirut attractive to Saudis is not its touristic spots like Raouche, Solider or Aley but rather the freedom, diversity and individuality they can touch here, which represents a stark contrast to the conformity of their society. You think this is the case? Discuss.

The Old Turtle

turtle-clipart_2Mazen Baleelah, member of the Shoura Council, has been working to pass a new law criminalizing sexual harassment in the workplace. Some people supported him in his effort saying it is long overdue; some other people thought he is exaggerating and that sexual harassment is not yet a pressing issue that we need to deal with by legislation. However, the most surprising reaction so far has come from some female academics who spoke to al-Madinah daily last week. They objected to the proposal because they think such law would encourage mixing of the sexes in workplaces. Baleelah was quick to respond that although none of the six articles in the new law encourages mixing of sexes, such mixing is a reality of our everyday life in this age that we need to address properly if we want move forward.

What do I think about all of this? Well, the Shoura Council is dead to me so I’m not expecting anything good to come out of that place. Also, it seems ironic that some women are standing against a law that should protect women, but hey, what do I know? Finally, are we moving forward? Yes we are! We are moving forward, but really really slowly, like an old quadriplegic turtle.