Crown prince's death vexes
Saudis By Sami Moubayed
DAMASCUS - Saudi Arabia has lost its
second crown prince in less than a year with the
death on Saturday of Prince Nayef Bin Abdul-Aziz,
the powerful half-brother of King Abdullah.
Nayef's death at the age of 78 forces the kingdom
to address challenging questions.
When his
succession is settled, Saudi royals need to sit
down solemnly and discuss what is being endlessly
debated behind closed doors: what to do when the
ailing Abdullah, aged 89, parts the scene. With
all heirs to the Saudi throne way past retirement
age, the question of succession is more vital now
than ever, due to the King’s poor health and the
Arab Spring that broke out 16-months ago.
Nayef, a conservative Muslim, became crown
prince last October, and in light of the king’s
heath effectively also became de facto
ruler of Saudi Arabia.
Abdullah made him Second Deputy Prime Minister
back in 2009, a position usually reserved for
whoever was third in line to the Saudi throne. He
got along well with the king, having worked with
him in running day-to-day affairs in the 1990s,
when their older brother Fahd was incapacitated by
prolonged illness.
Since assuming the job
of Interior Minister in 1975, Nayef had been close
to the conservative clergy of Saudi Arabia, and
because of his hardline Sunni sympathies a loud
and aggressive opponent of both Iran and
Hezbollah, whom he accused of purposely sidelining
the Sunnis of Iraq and Lebanon.
With
little doubt, they grinned at his passing, given
that he had given Tehran a serious headache since
coming to power eight months ago. One of his
projects had been to support a Sunni Spring in
Baghdad, aimed at toppling Iran-backed politicians
who rose to power after the 2003 invasion; Muqtada
al-Sadr, Ammar al-Hakim, and Prime Minister Nuri
al-Malki.
Nayef had argued that Saudi
Arabia should never allow Iran to get the upper
hand in Iraq, seeing it as a direct threat to
Sunnis across the Middle East and the Gulf, and a
direct threat to the national security of Saudi
Arabia. His views on Iran, and his war with
al-Qaeda, made him an all-time favorite of the US.
He lived to see the demise of Osama bin Laden, but
died before his ambitions in Iraq were fulfilled.
The new crown prince Although a
successor has not yet been named, it will likely
be Prince Salman, the powerful defense minister,
who is yet another brother of King Abdullah and
Prince Nayef. The final say, however, will be for
the Allegiance Council that the king set up in
2006, bringing 34 members of the ruling family
under one umbrella to decide on any incoming heir
apparent.
Born in December 1935, Prince
Salman is 77 years old and the 25th son of the
kingdom’s founder Ibn Saud. His mother was the
powerful Hassa al-Sudairi, making him a member of
the “Sudairi Seven”. Actually, now that King Fahd,
Prince Sultan, and Prince Nayef are all dead, this
leaves a Sudairi Four, all half-brothers of
Abdullah. Salman became defense minister after the
passing of his full-brother Prince Sultan in late
2011. He trained at the hands of his father, who
was a legendary figure in Arab history, and after
Abdul-Aziz’s death, became Emir of the Saudi
Capital in March 1954. Under King Saud, he became
Governor of Riyadh in 1955 and kept this post
until 2011, with a brief interruption in
1960-1963.
During his tenure as governor
of Riyadh, Salman oversaw its transformation from
a wasteland into a major urban metropolis,
attracting tourism, investment, and real estate
development projects. Among his many memorable
feats was “cleaning” Riyadh from beggars,
deporting foreigners outside the country and
rehabilitating Saudis in a program at the Ministry
of Social Affairs. As a conservative Muslim,
however, he doesn’t believe that democracy is
compatible with Saudi Arabian culture.
Although in his 70s, he is close both to
the younger generation of Saudi royals, and
old-timers like the King and his Foreign Minister.
Additionally, he owns a media empire that runs the
popular and highly influential political daily
newspaper, Asharq al-Awsat, and the economic
title, Al-Eqtisadiah. He has all the qualities of
becoming king, but faces one crucial problem: his
age.
Salman, like the king, is not in good
health. He underwent spinal surgery in the US in
August 2010, and has suffered one announced
stroke, which left him bed-ridden for weeks. It is
unlikely that Salman will die before Abdullah,
meaning, if he makes it to the job of crown
prince, he will become the next monarch when King
Abdullah parts the scene. This highlights the
issue of succession, yet again, when many are
arguing that it is high time to pass on succession
from the sons of Abdul-Aziz to his grandsons,
whose rights to the throne were recognized in
March 1992 by King Fahd himself.
The next
generation, however, is either middle-aged, or
also, well into their 70s making it imperative
that one day, a royal decree needs to be passed,
granting succession to the third generation, King
Abdul-Aziz’s great grandchildren. Given the
advanced age and medical condition of the first
and second generation of Saudi royals, it is
likely that a king will die every two or three
years as what remains of King Abdul-Aziz's sons
and grandsons take their turn on the throne.
As the crown is passed on, prosperity,
stability and reforms will likely be slow, given
that all the potential monarchs are old and
ailing, certainly unattractive to ambitious Saudi
youth. More than half of its youth population is
below the age of 18. This is dangerous in light of
the Arab Spring, where Saudi youth, just like
those in Tunisia, Yemen, Egypt, Libya, and Syria,
are seeking political and economic change. They
are seeing Arab regimes fall all around them and
this undoubtedly is awakening their appetite for
change.
King Abdullah wisely managed to
abort the Arab Spring in Saudi Arabia - or delay
it - by ordering a massive increase in spending
back in mid-2011, up to US$130 billion over the
next 10-years. That muzzled dissent, and so did
grassroots affection for the monarch in Saudi
Arabia. Voices are already being heard demanding a
constitutional monarchy in the oil-rich kingdom,
with some even claiming that power should not
remain firmly concentrated in the hands of the
House of Saud. Young Saudi princes are harboring
political ambitions, and so are Saudi Shi'ites,
whose aspirations are being fanned continuously by
Iran.
These issues need to be addressed by
the House of Saud, in a serious and responsible
manner. To date, nobody in the Saudi royal family
has answers to any of these questions.
Sami Moubayed is a Syrian
university professor and historian.
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