DAMMAM, 20 July — Seven-year-old Faris ibn Abdul Aziz Al-Arfaj won the top prize worth SR300,000 of the cultural contest held last May by Asharq Al-Awsat, a sister publication of Arab News..
"I was extremely happy when Mr. Yasser Al-Dabbagh, managing director of Saudi Research & Publishing Company informed me about the win," the boy’s father Abdul Aziz Al-Arfaj, 32, told Arab News.
Dr. Fahd Al-Tayash, director general of SRPC, and Salah Al-Balawi, chairman of Saab Group, also spoke to Abdul Aziz by phone to congratulate him, after taking part in the draw. Balawi was the guest of honor at a ceremony organized by SRPC to pick the winners.
Abdullah Al-Qahtani, assistant director general of SRPC as well as a representative of Arthur Andersen, external supervisor of the contest, took part.
Balawi’s participation in the draw came after Saab signed a strategic agreement with SRPC to provide new media services to the readers of SRPC publications using interactive technology.
Asharq Al-Awsat is scheduled to launch its first interactive contest named "Contest of Millions " in September.
Winner of the top prize will receive SR1 million while second and third prize winners will get SR300,000 and SR100,000 respectively.
The draw panel also picked 14 winners as part of the daily draw of the Asharq Al-Awsat contest for the past two weeks (July 1 to 14).
The winners belong to Saudi Arabia, Iran, Jordan, Morocco, Sudan, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
Abdul Aziz, director of administrative and financial affairs at a private company, said the prize was the result of joint efforts of his family.
Abdul Aziz brought home the newspaper, Faris cut the coupons and his mother wrote the answers.
"We have not yet decided how to spend the prize money," he said.
