Nasser Sabah Al-Ahmad, let’s turn to past pages

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WE do not exaggerate if we say that majority of Kuwait’s people were overjoyed when they heard about your appointment as first Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense because they are aware of your ambitious projects — from Madinat Al-Hareer (Silk City) to Kuwait Vision 2035, development of Kuwaiti islands and many others.

However, majority of these people felt bitter when they heard you talk about difficulties that impede you from taking quick decisions. You said, “Carrying out projects in Saudi Arabia is easy because decisions are taken through a single channel, while in our country we have constitutional institutions which make matters difficult.

I will not hide it from you, what you said bothered me the way it bothered many other people.

Let’s go back to history, in the early eighteenth century when Kuwaitis agreed to choose the House of Al-Sabah as leaders. This was due to what they saw in terms of ability to protect the country and its security.

Members of Al-Sabah family upheld their covenant, starting from the reign of Kuwait’s first ruler Sabah bin Jaber to Mubarak Al-Sabah (Mubarak Al-Kabeer) who protected Kuwait from the Ottoman-British conflict and then set the first pillars of independence.

After him came Ahmad Al-Jaber who protected Kuwait from being annexed to Iraq, Abdullah Al-Salem who is the actual founder of constitutional Kuwait, Sabah Al-Salem who loved his nation and Jaber Al-Ahmad who was the brain behind the major scheme to preserve national wealth through the generation fund.

Here we are with our Amir, Sabah Al-Ahmad, who rescued the country several times; especially when he issued the one-vote system decree which prevented Kuwait from falling into the unknown. This is in addition to his efforts in raising the status of Kuwait internationally until he deserved the title, International Humanitarian Leader, and Kuwait as International Humanitarian Center.

Sheikh Nasser, the course of history changed indeed during the reign of Sabah Al-Ahmad due to his firm stand in facing those who planned evil for this country, especially those who strived to loot the State and endorse it for their personal interests.

They did so through demonstrations and manipulation. They strived to misappropriate public funds for their personal electoral ambitions, claiming to be the majority. However, their claims were debunked and they were made to realize that they were just a minority who mastered the art of hiding behind slogans to achieve their objectives.

The ‘one vote’ election also proved they are the minority and they had nothing but intimidation, loud voice and tarnishing people’s integrity.

Sheikh Nasser, you know very well that the Constitution came under circumstances imposed on the region. This is in addition to Kuwait’s joining the United Nations and reaffirmation of the pledge between children of the same nation.

On the other hand, part of the ruler’s mandate was taken from him and given to the National Assembly. Immediately after it happened, the population structure started changing in a manner that affects the society and the State.

From there, we started to see strange phenomena in our country, such as demonstrations and chaos concocted in previous years; in addition to calls for the ‘people’s government’ and other imported miseries with the aim of turning Kuwait upside-down, similar to the current situation in the Arab world.

These miseries prompted some people to repeat the infamous and obnoxious speech entitled, “We will never allow you,” targeting the Amiri entity; as well as the storming of the National Assembly and their profanity against the integrity of the judiciary.

At that time, Kuwait almost got lost if it were not for the decisive stance which reflected the determination and wisdom of HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah in averting the disaster that is similar to the invasion.

Here they are still trying to push for parliamentary dictatorship. Their latest attempt is to put a Parliament member above accountability and the law through their proposal to prevent the prosecution of an MP regardless of the crime he committed.

Those who continue to be wicked attempted to usurp the powers of the ruler once again as some of them submitted a proposal to bar him from supporting Egypt and then put the matter in the hands of the Parliament.

Everyone knows the objective of such a proposal. Those behind it were instructed by their political ‘Brotherhood’ backer, who wanted to fight with the people of Egypt for their stance against the group which attempted to rob Egypt through their plan to hijack the rule on the night of Jan 25, 2011.

Sheikh Nasser, the invasion and liberation were supposed to form a historic hinge in political life. Unfortunately, it did not happen.

Instead, we saw the unprecedented parliamentary and political recklessness; up to the extent that a government was formed but it did not last for more than 55 days.

Within a quarter of century after the invasion, 22 governments were formed as if Kuwait is attempting to break the world record in the formation of governments, competing with Italy when Rome was living in political mess.

Nonetheless, the European country, at the time of political awareness, rescued itself from the mess by amending the Constitution; exactly as it happened with Charles de Gaulle who launched the ‘Fifth Republic’ when he noticed the political frivolity that threatened France.

History is saturated with examples of this issue, including Abraham Lincoln who strived to amend the Constitution when he felt that civil war would destroy the United States. These examples indicate that constitutions are man-made, not divine scriptures.

At some point in Kuwait’s history, the Constitution was supposed to be amended to stop political recklessness and shut the doors to external threats encouraged by the internal event.

The impact of the ‘Monday diwaniyas’ is not a secret to anyone. This is in addition to several others which encouraged Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait since Saddam believed that Kuwait’s internal front was easy and exposed. In fact, he thought that Kuwait was a suitable target.

Since 1992, we have been living in a parliamentary and political mess and systematic looting of public funds through overseas medical tours, random appointments and employments or suspension of development projects such as the ‘Dow Chemicals’ and the northern oil fields.

This happened because some MPs only care about cutting their share from every project or accusing others of stealing public funds. All of this is happening under the pretext of constitutional mandate. In reality, they are the first to violate the Constitution and the last to protect it.

Sheikh Nasser, you are definitely working to achieve your dreams. You realized that some of these dreams are premature while others are necessary for Kuwait and its development. Such dreams will be realized only through decisiveness.

The helm of the rule has a lot of codified tools which could turn dreams into reality, not just on paper. These tools include the dissolution or suspension of the Parliament, and other measures which can be taken to rescue the country from this mess.

Therefore, if you believe that projects in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kingdom of Bahrain, State of Qatar or Sultanate of Oman are executed easily because the presence of a single decision channel; our leadership has powers which could achieve more than that. However, this necessitates a horse, knight and a sharp sword.

Sheikh Nasser, do not repeat for us what you said to Bloomberg. If you do so, you will disappoint and smother us.

By Ahmed Al-Jarallah – Editor-in-Chief, the Arab Times

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