Don’t delude our leadership that ‘it is useless’… decision is missing

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NO one expects miracles in Kuwait, as the case in some Arab countries. The complexities, sensitivities, problems and sediments of the past three decades; the accumulated doubts; the coloration of the corrupt and looters, their shapes and forms; and reports about them — or what they tell their followers, made everyone fear these personalities even when they get exposed.

Even if the State and Interpol pursue them, they find someone to defend them. This is due to the fact that they used to cover their loot with crumbs that they offered to the poor, so it would be said that they are benevolent and generous.

In fact, they are nothing more than one who eats the flesh of their people. No matter how colorful they are, they remain the same. When they commit theft, the first thing they do is transfer the stolen money abroad. Therefore, neither they nor their people benefit from their loot.

It has been narrated that one of the famous thieves during the Abbasid Dynasty era — Adham bin Ascala — when he was on his deathbed after a history of banditry, uttered this advice for his followers: “Do not steal from a woman, a poor person or a neighbor. If you steal from someone’s house, then steal half of it and leave the other half for him to live on with his family. Do not be scoundrels, oppressors or murderers.”

Far from idealism that contradicts banditry, treachery and plundering people’s money; some of these stories and philosophies contain what could be a lesson for the thieves of today, who have mastered systematic looting and robbery in many ways that did not occur to all the thieves who preceded them.

For instance in Lebanon, a corrupt political and financial class took possession of people’s deposits and denied them even the right to undergo treatment.

Whereas in Kuwait, some plunder public money to the point of impunity. In fact, the immoral ones have established a Deep State within the State. They obstruct every project if they have no share in it, or whisper in the ears of officials that being fair to the people means making them get used to taking things for free.

Thus, they forbid any step aimed at easing the burdens of people — whether simple loans or debts, or even in terms of putting the right man in the right place, because the ‘this is our son’ rule is always ready for implementation.

These include the three thieves in the short story of Russian writer Leo Tolstoy who conspired to rob a peasant.

The first thief stole his goat, and put the bell on the donkey’s neck; while the second stole the donkey after gaining its trust and directed it to the destination of the thief to catch up with him. As for the third thief who was able to gain his sympathy, he stole his clothes.

In the first narration, sometimes the thief is better off than the bribed official who devours public money, as well as the untrustworthy merchant. These characters currently exist in most Arab countries.

In Kuwait, some gain the trust of the leadership and then betrays him, or are good at playing innocent while engaging in injustice before seizing everything, including the people’s clothes.

These people, and sometimes the officials, lose sight of the fact that a wise man does not get stung twice in the same hole; but they continue to expand the circle of the corrupt in order to delude the leadership or the stakeholders that “it is useless” and they cannot fix it.

The truth is: Once a firm decision is found, it could blow up the Deep State and reform the country.

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

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