Former US President Bill Clinton and session chairman Prince Faisal ibn Salman, chairman of the Saudi Research and Marketing Group, take part in a question-answer session following Clinton’s speech. (AN photo by Khalid Mahmoud)

JEDDAH, 20 January 2004 — Former US President Bill Clinton yesterday called for women to be given a greater role in Saudi Arabia. Delivering the main keynote address of the 2004 Jeddah Economic Forum, he questioned whether any modern economy could be built if women were excluded from participating.

Clinton also called for more to be done to support a just and lasting peace in the Middle East, and one which gives a state to the Palestinians while also guaranteeing Israel’s right to exist. Praising Crown Prince Abdullah’s Middle East peace initiative plan, he said that without a settlement of the Palestinian issue, there was no chance of peace in the region.

However the political problems of the Middle East were not his prime concern.

The former president was in reflective mood yesterday. The need for change was his main theme, but it was not just the need for change in Saudi Arabia that concerned him, rather the need for change across the world, including the US. “We all have to change,” he said, quoting what he described as Clinton’s Law of Politics. This was that every one is in favor of change, but that no one wants it when it affects them. “We fear change, because it might lead to loss of power, of control, even of identity itself,” he said, but no one could fight the “tide of change”.

The US, would have to face change too, he said. Today it is the world super power but China and the EU may well supplant its economic supremacy. Whether the US then remains a military super power will be for others to decide. If they opt to invest the same as what the US spends on the military then the US dominance will be over, he said.

But there was none of the pointed demands for change, notably in the Saudi education system, that characterized his speech the last time he spoke at the Forum. That was two years ago, just four months after Sept. 11. This time, further away from the event, he was in softer mode — although he repeated his call for Saudi Arabia to invest in alternative energy technology, such as solar power; people were not going to stop using oil, there was no danger to Saudi revenues, but alternative energy, he said, represents a $1-trillion market.

Saudi Arabia has made the decision to change, he said. The only question is how much change and when. He offered his suggestions. If the Kingdom is to grow, it needs to diversify its economy, he said. It needs more jobs, more investment, it needs to end the brain drain affecting the entire Middle East, it needs to harness the power of its people and it needs to stress more on education, particularly science. There has to be more participation in society. All this can be done, he said, “without compromising” the Kingdom’s faith and culture.

The fight against poverty in the world was central to the former president’s ideas. One suggestion was that Saudi Arabia divert 10 percent of its $2 billion aid program from building mosques and Islamic institutions to help provide safe drinking water in poor Muslim countries. But the fight against poverty required international cooperation. “Modern problems require us to work together,” he said.

At times Clinton was more lighthearted. His call for greater women’s involvement saw him throwing in his support for women drivers in the Kingdom. Pointing to the fact that the Prophet Muhammad’s first wife, Khadeeja, was a businesswoman, he said that if cars had been around at the time, she would have driven one. The Prophet, he said “probably would have made Saudi Arabia the first automobile producing nation on earth and put his wife in charge of the business,” he added. The comments drew applause.

The tone turned distinctly philosophical when the former president addressed the problem of extremism. If people believe that they have the whole truth, they will regard those with different ideas as less than human. He preferred to see life as a journey toward truth. The truth is there, but humans are unable to see it completely. As for those who want to blame others for the problems in the world, such thinking breeds a sense of powerlessness and increases alienation, he said.

There was no standing ovation this time, apart from the ranks of American delegates at the front of the auditorium who had come as part of the Clinton entourage. But it was not that sort of speech. It was not a stirring call to arms, rather a quiet assessment of the road ahead from a former statesman with time on his hands to think things through. But in line with that, the applause seemed more thoughtful, even appreciative.