JEDDAH, 2 October 2004 — There is a move to expand the National Dialogue Forum to cover the problems and issues of expatriate workers in the Kingdom, according to Dr. Abdullah Omar Naseef, vice president of King Abdul Aziz National Dialogue Center.
“The idea of holding dialogue with expatriates was first presented at an open debate in Arar,” Naseef said. “We’ll take up this matter with the supreme committee. I think it deserves consideration and the dialogue must focus on the problems facing expatriates,” he said.
There are more than seven million expatriates in the Kingdom, most of them working in the private sector.
Dr. Naseef also indicated that the fifth or sixth dialogue forum would be held with foreign parties such as the Federation of Roman Catholic Churches in Vatican or the Middle East Council of Churches in Beirut. “We have already started dialogue with people of other faiths,” Okaz daily quoted him as saying.
The National Dialogue Forum, initiated by Crown Prince Abdullah last year, has been instrumental in taking up pressing issues facing Saudi society. It gave people of different views and backgrounds including Islamic scholars, academics and intellectuals a platform to debate vital issues to strengthen national unity.
So far three dialogue forums have taken place. The first forum in Riyadh led to the formation of the King Abdul Aziz National Dialogue Center while the second in Makkah dealt with issues ranging from extremism, nepotism and violence to politics and economics.
The third forum in Madinah focused on issues related to women.
Fifty elite figures representing various views and political trends and a number of moderate and liberal thinkers as well as representatives of the Shiite minority took part in the first dialogue forum held in Riyadh in June last year. The conference dealt with religious fanaticism, women’s rights, freedom of expression, and other issues and their impact on national unity.
Some 75 Saudi intellectuals, Islamic scholars, media persons and researchers took part in the second dialogue session in Makkah in December. The five-day event was held under the theme “Extremism and moderation, a comprehensive view.” The conference came up with 17 recommendations that were submitted to Crown Prince Abdullah.
The dialogue on women held in June in Madinah ended with a call to respect the equality of sexes granted by Islam. Opening the Madinah forum, Sheikh Saleh Al-Hosayn, president of the dialogue center, said civic debate must be based on Islamic teachings and embrace plurality.
The Dialogue Center is now making preparations to hold the fourth round of national dialogue in Dammam next month focusing on youth issues. A number of workshops are being organized in various regions with the participation of educational, health and sporting institutions to prepare for the forum. The dialogue would focus on three pivotal topics: Youth and education; youth and society; and youth and work.
