MANAMA, 11 June 2004 — Bahraini businessmen complain of being sidelined and are seeking a political role in order to defend their interests against Islamist tendencies in the Kingdom.
“The government gives more importance to politicians than to businessmen. They need to acknowledge that the development of the economy is the job of the private sector which should in turn have some political role,” said businessman Faruq Al-Muayyed.
“But in order for the private sector to be able to play this role, we absolutely need political stability so we can attract foreign investment,” he said.
“For decades, the climate in Bahrain has been liberal. But now the extremists are trying to block all change.
“We absolutely have to get down to work to ensure that businessmen turn their hand to politics with a view to the 2006 elections.”
For Muayyed and others the need for a greater political say was driven home by the cancellation in March of the locally produced Arab version of the television series “Big Brother”.
The Arab satellite channel Middle East Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) lost $6.2 million when the show was taken off air following an outcry, mainly from Islamist members of Parliament.
They claimed that the show violated Islamic and Arab mores by showing men and women living together outside of marriage.
“The Big Brother affair should serve as a warning. Businessmen came to invest millions of dollars in Bahrain, but the government chose to side with politicians to the detriment of business,” said the local analyst and journalist Sausan Al-Shayer.
She says the problem is that local businessmen are too weak on the political front, adding: “Business can only succeed if one takes risks.”
Academic Abdallah Al-Hawaj said: “Businessmen have lost a lot of their political influence because of government meddling in business. “We need transparent legislation to separate personal and state interests in order to overcome this interference.”
Human rights activist Ubeidalli Al-Ubeidalli agreed. He said the private sector had lost its economic weight to the state which controls the oil and other key sectors. As a result, business leaders were losing their clout.
Ubeidalli urged business “to get involved in the political debate” in order to defend themselves against its undercurrents.
Bahrain returned to parliamentary politics in 2002 when its elected chamber was revived as part of reforms spearheaded by King Hamad that turned the state into a constitutional monarchy. Islamist parties won more than half the votes in the elections, which were the country’s first in more than 30 years.
The chamber had been dissolved in 1975 after it clashed with the government over a state security law. The country has no law governing political parties but the authorities tolerate a large number, most of which are represented in the chamber.
