King Fahd, who ruled Saudi Arabia for 23 years, was one of the Arab world’s most brilliant and wisest statesmen. He guided the Kingdom through the most turbulent periods in its history, which saw two Gulf wars; he introduced vital political reforms and left an economy experiencing its greatest growth in two decades.
King Fahd ascended the throne in June 1982, at the height of Saudi Arabia’s economic boom. His reign saw the country making tremendous progress in the political, social, educational, economic and industrial sectors. His rule also marked the transformation of Saudi Arabia from a predominantly rural society into a modern urban one with a major role in regional and international politics.
In 1992, King Fahd introduced the Basic Law of Government, the Shoura Council System and the Regional Council System as well as partial elections to the country’s municipal councils. The establishment of the National Society for Human Rights, the Supreme Economic Council, the Supreme Council for Petroleum and Minerals, the Supreme Commission for Tourism and the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority as well as enacting new foreign investment and taxation laws and the restructuring of ministries were other reforms he introduced.
King Fahd died in a Riyadh hospital on Aug. 1, 2005 after a long illness. His body was buried in a simple grave at Al-Oud Public Cemetery in Riyadh. World leaders including President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, Algerian President Abdel Aziz Bouteflika, Syrian President Bashar Assad, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa attended his funeral.
King Fahd was considered a Middle East peacemaker. “He engaged himself with dialogue between the Islamic world and the West with intelligence, far-sightedness and great personal commitment,” German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said in his condolence message sent to King Abdullah. “His balanced policies and mediation in the Middle East brought him and Saudi Arabia respect and recognition around the world,” he added.
“The late monarch was always committed to the promotion of just causes for the well-being of Muslims around the world,” said Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who led a 24-member delegation to the funeral. “His services to Muslims in providing facilities for Haj endeared him to tens of millions of Muslims across the world.”
“King Fahd was a most respected leader of his people and symbolized the unity and solidarity of the entire Muslim world,” said Bangladesh President Iajuddin Ahmed. “He will be remembered by his friends and admirers for his prudent leadership and invaluable contribution to peace, stability and the progress of humanity,” he said.
“King Fahd’s achievements were incredible,” said French President Jacques Chirac. “He was the dynamic force behind the political, economic and social development of the Kingdom,” said Chirac who flew in to Riyadh to attend the funeral. US President Bush was unable to attend the funeral, but sent Vice President Dick Cheney with a high-level delegation. Bush said he was “deeply saddened” by the death of King Fahd, who he called “a man of wisdom” and “a friend and strong ally of the United States for decades.”
Chinese President Hu Jintao conveyed condolences to the Kingdom over the death of King Fahd, calling the late monarch “an old and esteemed friend of the Chinese people.” “King Fahd made an important contribution to the construction of modern Saudi Arabia, the development of the Saudi national economy and the peace and development in the region and the world,” Xinhua news agency quoted Hu as saying.
The magnificent expansions of the two holy mosques in Makkah and Madinah were perhaps King Fahd’s greatest accomplishments. Anticipating a tremendous growth in the number of people coming for the annual pilgrimage, he called for a complete review of the Haj amenities as well as the design of the holy sites themselves. In 1988, he laid the foundation stone for what is in fact the third Saudi expansion of the Grand Mosque in Makkah.
The fabulous works included the expansion of the western wing of the existing mosque to accommodate in excess of a million worshippers during the holy month of Ramadan and during the Umrah and Haj seasons. The mosque’s roof has been expanded to provide over 60,000 sq. mt. of extra prayer area, while a further 86,000 sq. mt. has been created in the surrounding plaza.
One of the extraordinary features of the Madinah Mosque expansion was the creation of 27 main plazas, every one of which is equipped with a state-of-the-art sliding dome which can be rapidly opened or closed according to the weather. The project included building six new minarets, each soaring 105 meters and crowned with a gold-plated crescent, each weighing no less than four tons. The Prophet’s Mosque can now accommodate over a million worshippers.
King Fahd, who was widely known as a man of peace, was successful in bringing leaders of Lebanese factions to the Saudi resort of Taif in 1989 to hammer out an accord to end 15 years of civil war. King Fahd’s Middle East peace proposals known as the Fahd Plan, inspired the Madrid peace conference and the subsequent negotiations. Even today, virtually all attempts at reviving the peace process are structured around key elements of the Fahd Plan.
Stability in the Gulf had long been one of King Fahd’s major concerns. In the weeks prior to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, he had tried to mediate between Kuwait and Iraq. When Iraq finally opted for brute force, he realized that the time for conciliation was over. Instead he put his diplomatic skills to help pull together a coalition of Arab, Islamic and other forces to implement UN Security Council resolutions and ensure the liberation of Kuwait. When he visited Kuwait shortly after coalition forces finally freed the country in February 1991, Kuwaiti Crown Prince Saad Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah was not exaggerating when he said that the king’s “wise and immediate decision” to help liberate Kuwait had been instrumental in rallying the international community.
King Fahd’s legacy at home is not the buildings, the roads, the ports and airports, wrote Dr. Fouad Al-Farsy, Haj minister and former information minister, in his book entitled Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd Bin Abdul Aziz. “It is the people who, through education and social services, have been transformed from simple, generally illiterate tribesmen or traders into literate individuals, capable of standing on their own and competing in the modern world,” he adds. “King Fahd presided over the implementation of the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th Five-Year Development Plans,” he points out.
Dr. Al-Farsy devotes one full chapter to discussing King Fahd’s contributions to the country’s educational development. King Fahd was the country’s first education minister. “The task of establishing a national educational system fell to Prince Fahd. It must have been an extraordinarily daunting task. Literacy rates were low. There were very few elementary schools for the general population, let alone secondary schools or universities. Only 35,000 children were attending any kind of school at that time,” the author says. Now there are more than 4.7 million students and 14 universities in the Kingdom.
King Fahd has passed away leaving his indelible imprint on all aspects of the Kingdom’s steady development. Under his leadership, Saudi Arabia became a modern, fast growing industrialized state, with an educated population well-equipped to face the challenges of the time. King Fahd was a great leader who made outstanding contributions to the betterment of the Arab and Islamic worlds as well as promoting world peace and international stability.
