JEDDAH, 14 April 2004 — Princess Sarah Al-Anqari, the wife of Makkah Governor Prince Abdul Majeed, will pay for all further surgery for Rania Al-Baz, who was savagely beaten by her husband earlier this month, Arab News has learned.
“Princess Sarah has ordered my transfer to King Faisal Specialist Hospital where all my surgery will be done at her expense,” Rania said yesterday.
She said Jawhara Al-Anqari, a senior member of the National Human Rights Association, visited Rania at her hospital bed on Monday and said that she will personally see to it that justice is done and that Rania’s rights are protected.
“I feel that I have been reborn”, said Rania in an interview with Arab News from her parents’ home, where she is recovering from a brutal beating at the hands of her husband. “I feel that I have been given a second chance at life.”
Al-Baz’s husband, Muhammad Bakar Yunus Al-Fallatta, is wanted by police.
Rania, a television presenter with Saudi Arabia’s Channel 1, described the attack as being different from previous beatings she has received at Al-Fallatta’s hands. “This time he really wanted to kill me,” she said.
Al-Baz suffered 13 facial fractures and needs plastic surgery. According to doctors at Bugshan Hospital, she has a 70 percent chance of a full recovery, but only after numerous operations and plastic surgery. In one operation, cartilage will be removed from her ear and transplanted into her nose to replace the cartilage that was shattered there during the attack. Currently, a nail has been drilled into her skull through her nose to keep it open and allow her to breathe.
“When his hands were around my neck, he told me to recite the shahada because, he said, I was about to die. He took his hands off my throat long enough for me to say, ‘There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is His prophet’ three times, then I surrendered my soul to Allah. Muhammad then went on to choke and beat me some more until I lost consciousness,” she said.
According to Rania, her husband has been out of work for three years. “He has been depressed, and a year ago he started talking about committing suicide. I want the police to find him not so that he can be jailed, but because I am worried that he may do something to himself,” she said.
Arab News asked Rania how she felt about her husband now. Does she still love him? “That is a very tough question. I don’t know. I have to hear from him why he did this to me before I can form an answer. However, I have absolutely no intention of returning to him, ever.”
According to Rania, the attack happened in front of the couple’s five-year-old son, Saud. “Saud woke up when he heard the struggle and came into the room to see his father on top of me beating and choking me. He now asks me, ‘Mama, why did Baba make you look ugly? I liked how you looked before.’ I try to tell him that it wasn’t his father that did this to me, but he laughs and tells me, ‘You are lying, I saw him.’
“I don’t want my children growing up to hate their father,” she added.
Astonishingly, Rania is worried about her husband. “I don’t want him to be hurt, because he has hurt himself enough with what he has done to me. As far as I am concerned, I am happy if he just leaves me and my children alone,” she said.
Though spousal abuse is common in Saudi Arabia, there is no study suggesting that it is more prevalent here, than in any other country, Rania said. “What is different here in Saudi Arabia is how the authorities handle such cases.”
In Al-Fallatta’s case, authorities are trying particularly hard to catch him, not only for spousal abuse, but for attempted murder as well.
