Saudi reformists are growing more pessimistic as the kingdom applies brakes on the political reform process, by Rashid Abu Al-Samh The imprisonment and ongoing trial of three Saudi reformists has cast a dark shadow of doubt over the entire Saudi reform movement. Arrested last March for calling for a constitutional monarchy and an independent judiciary, Ali Al-Demaini, Matruk Al-Faleh and Abdullah Al-Hamed are now paying the price for pushing for change. The trial takes place against the backdrop of renewed terrorist attacks on foreigners in Saudi Arabia. On Sunday 26 September, a Frenchman was shot dead in the Red Sea metropolis of Jeddah. On 15 September a British man was also shot dead in the Saudi capital Riyadh. The announcement on 13 September by the Saudi authorities warning Saudi government employees to refrain from publicly criticising government policies on satellite television, in newspaper articles and in petitions, only served to further chill the atmosphere and send the message that perhaps reformists had already crossed too many red lines. "It's an indication that the reform plan is not going down well with everybody," said a senior Saudi government official who spoke on condition of anonymity. The vagueness of the Saudi government warning confused people interviewed by Al-Ahram Weekly. As a result, most interviewees requested that their comments be off the record. One of the few people who agreed to be interviewed on the record, Khaled Al-Dakhil, a pro-reform professor of political sociology at King Saud University in Riyadh, said that the country was going backwards in terms of reform. "The warning about criticising the government was clearly aimed at those who have been appearing on television shows and discussing reform," said Al-Dakhil. On the reformists' trial, Al-Dakhil is equally pessimistic: "At first I thought putting them on trial would be the first step in releasing them, but now I'm not sure. I know that eventually they will be released, but how and when is still not clear." A Saudi analyst in Riyadh told the Weekly that on the face of it the Saudi government warning was nothing new and a legitimate right of any government. "The law has been around for at least 40 years. A government and even private companies can place restrictions on what their employees say publicly, but in this case I think they want to remind people that they can't sign petitions," said the analyst. But he added that perhaps the Saudi government was aiming the restriction at academics teaching at state-run universities. "A government has a legitimate interest in limiting public dissent -- but when you extend it to more junior officials and academics it has a chilling effect." Reform drives in the kingdom have been taking place since the 1950s, mostly in the passive form of private petitions signed by reformists and handed over to rulers in private meetings. Occasionally, dissent has bubbled over into public protests such as the violent takeover of the Holy Haram Mosque in Mecca in 1979 by Islamic extremists or the group of Saudi women who drove their cars through Riyadh in 1991 to protest against the still existent ban on women driving in the country. Being an absolute monarchy means that change in the kingdom has been extremely slow in coming. After municipal elections were suspended in 1962 during the reign of King Faisal Ibn Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud, and the oil boom of the late 1970s and which came to an abrupt end in the mid-1980s, Saudis busied themselves with nation-building, saying that democracy could come later. Now 20 years after the oil boom, and after the Gulf War of 1991 in which hundreds of thousands of United States troops were stationed in the kingdom, reformists of all ideological hues have emerged, ranging from Islamists to liberals. Although they don't agree on all points, they do agree that more accountability of government officials is needed, that citizens need to have a say in how the country is run and that rampant corruption and favouritism have to be curbed. The 11 September 2001 attacks on New York City and Washington by Al-Qaeda terrorists, most of whom were Saudi, were a wake-up call to many Saudis that change had to take place in the country and fast. "I joined the reform movement after 9/11 as the attacks shook the authority of the state because some of the concepts that it based itself on are what hatched 15 of the 19 hijackers," said 28-year-old Jeddah businessman Ahmed Adnan in an interview with the Weekly. "The current islah (reform) movement began about a year after 9/11 when 60 reformists signed a petition that was sent to Crown Prince Abdullah," explained Adnan. Fifteen of the petitioners later met the crown prince in private and reported that the petition had been received extremely favourably. Despite the favourable reception of the original petition, many Saudi analysts admit that a power struggle within the royal family is taking place behind the scenes, with more progressive and liberal princes pitched against the more traditional ones. The pendulum swings back and forth between both camps, but it now seems to have swung back into the conservative camp. Although Adnan didn't sign that original petition, he has signed three subsequent ones: One calling for a constitutional monarchy, another denouncing terrorism in the kingdom, and the last one expressing solidarity with the three reformists undergoing trial in Riyadh. But the arrest and trial of the three reformists has been a warning for many reformists like Adnan, who now feel it better to focus on making a living than pressing for reform. "After two years of working on reform, I'm now focussing on buying my own house and making money. I'm not signing any new petitions. You can't eat democracy," explained Adnan. The explosion in penetration of satellite television and the Internet in the Middle East have made airing grievances against the government much easier. The Qatari satellite television station Al-Jazeera in particular pioneered a bold, anti- establishment style that was never before seen in the region. Saudi reformists are regularly interviewed live on Al-Jazeera, with several having been arrested by Saudi police while giving an interview on the telephone to the station. Ironically, at about the same time the original 11 reformists were being arrested in Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam (eight were later released, including Jeddah businessman Mohamed Sayed Tayeb, after signing undertakings that they wouldn't sign any more petitions, talk to the press, or travel abroad), it was announced that the country's first human rights organisation was being formed. Named the National Human Rights Association (NHRA) and headed by Abdullah Obeid, the group brought together prominent Saudis from various fields, including several women, to promote human rights. Unfortunately, the group has not yet been able to show any concrete results. Some members of the NHRA have complained that it is too early to expect a six-month-old organisation to show significant results, especially considering that most of their members are only part-time and busy with their regular jobs. But relatives of the three reformists still in jail complained to the local press last month that the NHRA was trying to take credit for helping them when they allegedly had not. Defending the group's role, Bakr Bagader, a professor of sociology at King Abdul-Aziz University in Jeddah and a NHRA member, said that they are in fact following the case of the three reformists. "We are following them all the way. We are doing what any human rights group in the world does to ensure that their rights are being protected and that no procedural mistakes are being made," explained Bagader. "Unfortunately, some of the relatives feel we have the power to get the reformists released, which we do not. We are not a government institution nor an opposition party." The trial of the three reformists is being held in public, a rare occurrence in the kingdom. The reformists allegedly threatened to go on a hunger strike if their trial wasn't public. After the government agreed to an open trial, the three attended a second hearing on 23 August in Riyadh, but it was postponed after 300 relatives and supporters showed up trying to fit into a courtroom with only 30 seats. Some press reports tried to blame unruly relatives and supporters for the postponement of the trial, but a Saudi journalist who attended the hearing told the Weekly another story. "Policemen blocked the passageway between the 11th floor where family members were gathered and the 12th floor where the courtroom is located. We tried several times to go up, but the policemen blocked our way. Finally a senior policeman gave the okay and we pushed our way up," the journalist recounted. But when they arrived at the courtroom, they found most seats occupied by plainclothes policemen. "Until now no date has been set for their trial to resume," said the reformists' lawyer Abdul-Rahman Al-Lahem in a telephone interview from Riyadh. "What happened during the last hearing made the judges re- think whether or not they want to keep the trial open. They blame the defendants and their families for what happened last time. But we believe the blame lies with the security forces," he explained. In a subsequent meeting between Al-Lahem and the judges in late September, the judges informed the lawyer that the trial would continue "in camera", closed to the public. The defendants have refused to take part in such a setting and no new date has been set for the trial to resume. Although Al-Lahem admits that his clients are being treated well in jail, he believes that they were not arrested with the proper warrant and that they will eventually be found not guilty. "They are charged with organising, writing and signing petitions, but hundreds of Saudis have also done that. A guilty verdict would be an indictment not just of my clients but of all reformists," said the lawyer. One of the charges levelled against the three reformists was that they were using Western terminology in asking for change, but Al-Lahem denies that pointing out that their petition used Jordan, Morocco and Kuwait as examples of constitutional monarchies, and not the United Kingdom as was rumoured. "There is no contradiction between Shariaa (Islamic law) and a constitutional monarchy. The petition itself was based on Shariaa and took examples from Shariaa. Shariaa is of course above a constitution, but we need a written constitution to protect people's rights and decrease the unlimited powers of political institutions," explained Al-Lahem. But it is unclear how many Saudis are now willing to put their freedom on the line for reforms. With the surge in terrorism in the kingdom this year and with record oil revenues, many analysts believe the pressure on the government to forge ahead with reforms has been lessened. Unprecedented nationwide municipal elections, to be held from February 2005, hold a glimmer of hope that change is happening, but the likelihood that women will be excluded from voting has put a damper on initial excitement. In the end, most reformists agree that change will happen, whether the government likes it or not. "We want Saudi Arabia to remain," said a crestfallen Adnan. "Change is here in the region and it will happen whether they want it to or not. But we'd be happier if the rulers initiated change and helped manage it."
