Of ‘maladies’ and medicine

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FOR the past four decades we have been courageously placing our palm to soothe the pain in our body. We shouted at the top of our voice that painkillers no longer had any effect. In spite of all this, we did not lose hope in our homeland and our capabilities and the ability of our generations to work a miracle to haul Kuwait out of the circle of bad management.

Yes, this is what we must confront since our housing crisis has failed to bring a roof over our heads, the health is bedridden and the education has increased illiteracy in our children. We do not form a united front to fight national issues, the infrastructure is in shambles and the government programs are a replica of the former governments.

We drift towards backwardness and find solace in tribalism and sectarianism instead of the homeland. To add insult to injury our speech is laced with partiality which is done deliberately either to protect our position and become more powerful or increase the power of parliamentary blocs.

All of this has only brought disaster to Kuwait. We have been saying and we continue to say the reason for falling backwards is because we succumb to big mouths that threaten and blackmail the country to satisfy a handful self-centered people.

Yes, our country is witnessing programmed looting of people’s money and the executive authority goes in the shell each time lawmakers pass a hint of grilling a government minister. When the government caves in it fails to realize that it gives up its role and thrusts the nation at the mercy of a few narrow-minded lawmakers who look at their parliamentary seat as a tool to satisfy their mean interests. Therefore, we have reached a level of deterioration and backwardness and the weakness now threatens our very existence.

When the government – for that matter any government – embraces the opportunists and turns away sincere friends, it is a sign that it is digging its grave. It also means the ministers have not read history well. They have not learned lessons from countries which are buried under a heap of ruins because their approach to life was wrong. The Arab history is full of examples.

Take for example the Umayyad Caliphate whose ruin was brought about by the opportunists who were given the charge of taking decisions. They took advantage and increased their power and entered the institutions and demolished them. Yes, this is the situation of Kuwait because it not only surrendered to those who falsely called themselves the ‘majority’, but embraced them and put them in charge of institutions until they fully controlled them and spread corruption.

Therefore, from the very beginning we called them ‘liars’ because they were the minority and opportunists. The reason behind our suffering is the fact that there are officials who adopt a double-standard policy and submit reports written in partial and sectarian ink. We saw their lies in their reports during hard times when truth was the national need of the hour. Their report was full of lies when some hundred citizens took to the streets but the report said tens of thousands of people.

This was done to terrify the nation and embezzle public money. This miserable condition is the reason why those who defend the country’s ideology have backtracked; because they saw how those who attacked the highranking officials and provoked others had become officials in various government departments. The governments in stable countries such as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and other GCC countries do not succumb to the wishes of the embezzlers.

Moreover, they do not turn their backs on those who defend the country’s ideology. They do not disregard embezzlements; they update surveillance to bring stability; whereas people in our country organize sit-ins at night and practice corruption in government offices in the morning as if nothing has happened because their interpretation of democracy is wrong.

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

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