Crown Prince Abdullah’s visit to a slum in Riyadh eight months ago took the Saudi people by surprise. Yet after all this time we continue to lack tangible measures to fight poverty that address the root causes and establish permanent solutions. All we have now is one housing project, initiated and implemented by a private individual.
As a first step, the fight against poverty must start by bringing to account all those who are responsible for concealing the problem in the first place. The second step should be a revision of all activities of charities and philanthropic organizations now active in the country. They have been turned into feeding farms that care for the lazy who sleep by day and spend the whole night watching satellite television.
The way these organizations operate has encouraged some to engage in begging after discovering a lucrative business, with the entire family roaming the streets asking for money.
Charities should be turned into teaching and training bodies that can prepare the poor to take up jobs and become self-sufficient. It is not enough to build houses for the poor, because after they move in they need money to spend on food, clothes and utility bills. Moving the poor to new homes means creating additional burdens. A family who used to live in one or two rooms will now need more money if they move into a three- or four-room house.
We shouldn’t ignore the social aspects of such a policy, because building special neighborhoods for the poor means having people belonging to a certain social status living apart from other members of society.
This may result in some sort of social segregation and could cause some to look down on these families. The poor themselves may develop a sense of shame, hatred and discontent toward others. Their children may not be able to tell their friends at school where they live. Poor neighborhoods may continue to be viewed as areas that still need charity even if their residents are fortunate and become rich.
To fight poverty we need to build at least a hundred factories in various parts of the Kingdom to provide work for some 10,000 people of both sexes. These would then be able to support themselves and their families without having to ask for charity. The economically less privileged would be turned into productive elements of society and eventually their name would be stricken off the list of the poor.
Instead of providing food and cash, the poor should be taught to master a trade. As the Chinese say: Instead of giving the poor a fish to eat teach them how to catch one.
Arab News From the Local Press 1 August 2003
