Imagination and drive

It was a real ordeal, according to Ahmad Mahmoud, its first editor, who explains how the staff had to slog for more than 16 hours daily throughout the first week. "All mistakes expected from amateurs were there. Photo captions were also wrongly placed."
Such was the beginning of Arab News, whose foundation was laid by Hisham and Muhammad Ali Hafiz, chief executives of the Al-Madina Printing Press. They took the plunge to put Saudi Arabia on the map of the publishing world. They may not have realized then that though Arab News, as the Kingdom's first English-language daily, marked a baby step in the nascent Saudi media industry, it would represent a giant leap for Al-Madina Printing Press, forerunner to the Saudi Research & Publishing Co. with a tally of 24 publications, of which 16 Arabic dailies, weeklies and monthlies, besides Arab News, survive today.
Muhammad Marouf Al-Shibani, who subsequently became managing director of Saudi Research & Publishing Co., told me later: "It used to take me 1-1/2 hours to dictate a story in Arabic on phone to Jeddah (from Riyadh, where he was posted as the branch manager). To get the line I had to wait for up to two hours. I would write in Arabic and they would translate my story into English. There was not much news then - just routine stuff about some government projects and tenders, new government regulations, procedures regarding issuance of visas, iqamas, etc." Most of the translation work used to be done by Farouk Luqman who later had a brief stint as the editor in chief of Arab News after serving for a long time as managing editor.
It was Khaled Almaeena, successor to Al-Shibani as editor in chief, who recognized the need for a makeover to turn things around. The paradigm shift got under way with the launch of a weekly column by Adil Salahi, an Islamic scholar from Damascus, on April 10, 1981. His highly popular column has been translated in many languages as he addresses current issues facing the Muslim community.
Almaeena's tenure was interrupted for a while during which Abdul Qader Tash took over as the editor in chief. His major contribution was to expand news coverage from the Islamic world. However, he left the newspaper to join a satellite channel, paving the way for Almaeena's return.
During his second term, Ustad Khaled (as we call him) focused on comprehensive sports news, major economic and political events, stock market coverage and women's issues, which got extra mileage thanks to a strong women's team in the three provinces. "From the Arabic Press," expatriate news coverage, including the launch of Pinoy Xtra, highlight Arab News role in staying tuned to its constituency. Another trail-blazing move on the advertising front was the launch of the Saudi Top 100 supplement, which today has become a marque on its own. "It was primarily the idea of Hazza Hafiz following the success achieved by other supplements," says Almaeena, who, as the public face of Arab News, has done a lot in propelling it up front as the leading newspaper of the Middle East.
Another milestone in its history was the launch of Arab News website in the interest of its readers, both within the Kingdom and abroad. What makes the website unique is the fact that it receives hundreds of thousands of hits daily from around the world. Letters to the editor, especially from the US and Britain, reflect the keen interest on the part of the readers to keep abreast of Saudi news and also try to understand the Arab-Israeli dispute from the Middle Eastern perspective.
Here credit should go to Prince Faisal bin Salman, chairman of Saudi Research & Marketing Group (SRMG), who has built upon the foundation of progress laid by his brother and former chairman of the company, late Prince Ahmed bin Salman. In an interview I conducted in 2008, he spelt out his future vision of Arab News, both in terms of English language journalism and development of its website to carry forward the newspaper's message.  "We do believe that language barrier is one of the main problems in training young people in the field of English journalism," Prince Faisal said. "However, we shall offer a course in English journalism at Prince Ahmed bin Salman Applied Media Institute, which we have set up in Riyadh. This institute is intended to become a center of excellence in the field of media studies, especially applied training in mass communications. It will be much more than theoretical courses, which universities offer." He also unveiled plans for further development of the Arab News website.
Behind the group's staying power and its ability to forge ahead amid challenges are the high professional caliber and strong commitment of Almaeena and his dedicated team. This point was also underlined by Usamah Kurdi, a distinguished Saudi businessman and a member of the Shoura Council.
In an interview, he told me: "Arab News has been able to attract good writers in the context of international, Middle East and Islamic issues as well as those concerning the expatriate community. I specially like the segmentation of news geographically. I always used to read Arab News when I was a member of the Majlis-e-Shoura, because it carried news of interest to the expatriate community and also those concerning other countries. Such news did not appear in the Arabic press which, in fact, used to do the follow-up to what had been published in Arab News."