JEDDAH, 4 January 2006 — Like all other recently formed municipal councils around the Kingdom, council members in Yanbu held their first meeting to elect their leadership.
Yanbu Mayor Abdul Aal Al-Sheikh won the position of municipal president Monday night by four votes against Saleh Al-Sayed, one of the council’s elected members. Sayed became the council’s vice president by default.
Like all of Saudi Arabia’s 178 municipal councils, half of Yanbu’s council members are elected while the other half, including the mayor’s seat, are appointed. The members will hold their first official meeting on Feb. 7. They have set the date of their regular meetings for the first Monday of every month.
One of the appointed members told Arab News in a phone call that the first priority of the council would be to assign each member a geographic area of responsibility. The council will also be divided into different committees, such as public services, financial affairs, administrative and others.
One of the more pressing issues, according to council members, is a list of about 15,000 pending claims of land grants from the municipality to citizens. Issues related to residential zoning and various investment projects are also on the list of the topics to be discussed in the coming year.
The members are to meet Yanbu Governor Ibrahim ibn Sultan today to discuss the overall vision of the council.
