14/08/2025
14/08/2025
SOME time ago, I wrote an article titled, “If there is a will, there is a way.” This proverb illustrates what must be done for institutions to succeed. In Management Science, there is a golden rule -- individual interests must be subordinated to public interests, not the other way around.
However, for decades, Kuwait has been living in the opposite pattern -- one that brought backwardness and decline for the country. For example, for years, we have been talking about the need to reform the electricity infrastructure and escape the cycle of fear every summer -- fear of power outages during the peak summer heat; as well as the need to import electricity from neighboring countries.
This entails an enormous cost for public finance. Unfortunately, this vital facility was subject to extortion by influential individuals who had their tools in the National Assembly, as it happened with every major project over the past 30 years. Instead of modernization, obstacles increased.
As a result, everything in Kuwait was declining, up to the point where we felt as if we were living in a 19th-century country with a modern appearance. So, whenever the government announces a project that benefits Kuwait today, everyone welcomes it. In this regard, the mere signing of the contract for the second and third phases of the Zour power plant is already a confirmation that the country is on its way to achieving success -- free from parliamentary interference and influential figures who made everything subject to a price they received in advance. Otherwise, they obstructed the projects through their influence in the National Assembly, Tenders Committee, Audit Bureau or various ministries.
If these projects were implemented long ago, Kuwait would have saved itself a great deal -- whether in terms of production disruption, time wasted due to power outages, or financially, as it has lost a lot, perhaps more than a billion Kuwaiti dinars in recent years. Nevertheless, as the saying goes, “Better late than never.” Today, we are living in a completely new era, unlike what we have known over the past three decades. This era is characterized by a desire for reform and at the same time, a swift decision-making process.
This is why Kuwait is experiencing a kind of developmental boom. While it is true that the construction of this new station -- which will greatly benefit Kuwait-- will begin operating three years from now, its speedy completion is required. Those who work are bound to make mistakes, and those who do not work will not make mistakes, but they will be dooming themselves to backwardness.
Therefore, there are many projects that the country has needed for decades, and which have been delayed significantly.
All of them are necessary and serve the national economy; starting with service infrastructure, through health and medical projects, which will make it a destination for medical tourism and ending with entertainment projects that encourage spending money domestically, rather than seasonal migration to neighboring countries during each vacation. These projects include the development of islands, acceleration of Mubarak Port completion and the new airport, among others. In other words -- in colloquial terms: “Let people come to the country, not Kuwaitis migrating to other countries.”