In his weekly column for Asharq Alawsat, Mshari Al-Zaydi talks about how new media—Facebook, the Internet, camera cell phones, etc.—have created a new force for accountability in government. He wonders whether this represents a fundamental change in the relationship between Saudi citizens and the state. I would answer with an emphatic ‘Yes!’
He recognizes that publicly-produced media provides a ‘cover’ for state-influenced media to report the facts, not the spin. It reflects popular anger and demands for accountability, neither of which generally get much space in Saudi media. That media, however, can point to photographs, videos, and first-person accounts to back up its reporters’ stories.
He cautions that the Internet can provide good and useful information, as it primarily is doing in this case, but that because it is unregulated, it can also provide false and self-serving disinformation. Telling the two apart is not always easy. Here, though, the overwhelming consistency of the images and reporting provide a background against which the disingenuous and agenda-driven reports stand out. They also provide a direct line between the people and the leaders, cutting out the bureaucratic middlemen who might seek to minimize the issue to protect their jobs and positions.
Al-Zaydi’s article is a good one, worth reading in full.
The Eyes of Jeddah
Mshari Al-ZaydiNothing is being discussed more these days in Saudi Arabia than the disaster of the Jeddah floods. This can be clearly seen in newspaper articles, front page headlines, and news reports. Key satellite television stations have covered the disaster, and continue to broadcast the latest developments. However the fastest and boldest medium being used in this media contest is the internet and social networking sites such as Facebook as well as internet forums and even SMS text messages. Video clips [of the disaster] are also being circulated by people, but these do not appear on television screens or in the newspapers.
We are facing an event that cannot be exclusively monopolized by any single media in its presentation to the public. This is why the Saudi media response [to the Jeddah floods] was unusually quick and intense. This all began a few years ago when journalists, reporters, and editors began to surf the internet themselves, opening personal accounts on Facebook and other sites, and contributing to internet forums. This is not to mention those who perhaps began to write on websites about Saudi affairs under pseudonyms.
… The only silver lining to this unfortunate tragedy is that it has caused the officials to realize that they are under public scrutiny. The officials are now aware that there are eyes that see, ears that hear, hands that write, tongues that talk, and more importantly cameras that record events and broadcast them to the world.
This feeling of being monitored by the public is useful and inevitable. Without public scrutiny it is impossible [for officials] to maintain a good and productive performance. This does not discredit the intentions of public officials, but rather this is the correct recipe for a healthy and productive [public] environment. With public scrutiny, the task of the official is to prove himself and his administration to the public, and improve the limitations of his performance. Since no man is infallible, and since officials are human by nature, and because the impacts of their mistakes goes beyond them and affects other people’s interests, there should have been safeguards in place to prevent such mistakes from happening, along with a mechanism for punishment and reward, and the monitoring of [official's] performance.
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Raising funds to repair mosques damaged or ruined by the Jeddah floods isn’t going to be permitted without express permission of the authorities, report Saudi Gazette/Okaz. The Saudi government clamped down on charitable fund raising after it was learned that many so-called charities were, in fact, nothing but covers for terrorist groups. They government isn’t going to relax that stricture simply because a flood turned Jeddah upside down. I think this is a good example of staying ahead of the curve.
No donations accepted for damaged mosques: Ministry
Taleb Bin MahfouzJEDDAH – The Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Endowment, and Guidance has warned against collecting donations for repairing flood-damaged mosques in Jeddah from anyone, including charity societies, unless instructed otherwise by the Makkah Emirate.
The ministry said that it has deployed teams to assess the damage incurred by 30 mosques in Jeddah’s flood-hit districts, vowing that the ministry will repair and furnish them.
Abdulaziz Hanfi, chairman of the Jeddah Charitable Qur’an Memorization Society, said that the society has also sent teams to check on the flood damage of facilities used for Qur’an memorization sessions. – Okaz/SG
Saudi Gazette/Okaz report that people are now seeking to assess blame (or excuse themselves from it) over the Jeddah flood disaster. A former chairman of the (partially) elected Municipal Council put responsibility directly at the feet of the Jeddah Mayor’s Office:
Jeddah Mayoralty failed to respond to warnings, says Municipal Council
Hussein HazzaziJEDDAH – The city was officially warned about the potential danger of flooding four years ago, said Tariq Fadaq, former chairman of the Jeddah Municipal Council. The Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs was also warned, he said.
Fadaq like many others, including two former Mayors of Jeddah Nazih Nasief and Abdullah Al-Mualimi, said he would be happy to help the investigation committee formed by King Abdullah to establish the reasons for the disaster that has claimed over 100 lives and to try to determine responsibility.
Fadaq said he still has copies of the detailed official documents containing the warning which were submitted to the Jeddah Mayoralty in the wake of the heavy rains that lashed the city some four years ago.
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While Jeddah road traffic 95% normal, says official, citizens are coming forth with their stories about how they coped with the floods. One points out that the Saudi Civil Defense office was among the first hit by the flooding, putting fire engines and other rescue equipment underwater before they could be brought into play:
‘I survived the flood, but they didn’t’
Hani BahasanJEDDAH – Residents of this flood-hit city all have their own stories to tell – of loss, despair and courage in the face of adversity. Here people of Guwaizah talk about their fight to survive as the deadly floods swept through the Guwaizah District last week.
Awada Al-Sulami, a staff sergeant in the Jeddah Traffic Department, is one of those people.
“I still can’t believe that I managed to rescue my whole family. When it started raining I was in Makkah on duty. I received a phone call from my family telling me that our house was being flooded by the rising water. I immediately asked permission to leave work and drove fast to my house in Guwaizah. I was shocked to find the ground floor of my house had been completely covered by the water. It was impossible to remove any of the furniture from the house. I managed to climb to the upper floor with my two wives and 12 children.” Al-Sulami said he broke his arm during the rescue.
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The media aren’t just piling on to Civil Defense, however. Saudi Gazette/Okaz also run this piece in which Civil Defense officials defend their operations:
Civil Defense defends its flood disaster performance
Ibrahim AlawiJEDDAH – In the wake of public criticism, the Civil Defense has defended its rescue operations during and after the massive floods in the city.
Brigadier Muhammad Abdullah Al-Qarni, Director of the Media Center at the General Directorate of Civil Defense, said he believes his men did a good job considering the magnitude of the disaster. He was speaking at a press conference in the Support Center at the Old Airport in Jeddah.“When we were assured that there would be no risk to the lives of our men, we intervened in an organized and considered manner and succeeded in rescuing many people with our land and air teams.”
Al-Qarni said the Civil Defense has provided shelter for more than 2,512 families consisting of 10,968 individuals.
He said the Civil Defense has now recommended setting up concrete barriers in Jeddah’s eastern valleys. The organization has identified all the valleys considered to be a threat to the Governorate. This information has been passed on to the Emir of Makkah.
The building of dams and barriers will be used for more than protection. It will also serve as a way to store water for the city, he added.
In response to a question, Al-Qarni said he was confident that the Civil Defense could evacuate many districts and residential areas close to Misk Lake, where the city’s raw sewage is contained. There are seven districts and residential areas close to the lake.
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Both individuals affected by the Nov. 25 flood that swept threw Jeddah and the charitable organizations trying to assist them are complaining that Saudi Civil Defense, the organization responsible for disaster relief, is letting them down. They complain of callous behavior by some, conflicting procedures about how to deal with destroyed homes by others. A general lack of coordination is seen by all as Arab News reports…
Civil Defense not doing enough, complain families of the missing
JEDDAH: Citizens living in Um Al-Khair, a Jeddah area affected by the severe floods, have accused the Civil Defense of negligence and a lack of responsibility toward those missing. Families of the victims say that they recovered 19 bodies all by themselves. They alleged the Civil Defense had not responded to calls for at least five days.
Residents said that the area is full of wild dogs feeding on the missing bodies. They also demanded action against those who approved their area for residential use despite the fact it was a valley for floodwater.
Thabit Al-Sulami, a resident who lost his brother in the tragedy, said that the role of the Civil Defense seems to be only in transporting the bodies recovered by the citizens. He said that it was down to their efforts that tractors were provided to clear the roads so they could reach disaster areas. He said that there was only one tractor in an area of five kilometers.
Volunteer Abdullah Al-Murtairi said he helped recover 15 bodies. He accused the Civil Defense of not helping properly and not answering emergency calls.
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Lack of disaster-management planning led to present crisis
Maha Akeel | Arab NewsJEDDAH: At a meeting of charity and civil society organizations involved in providing assistance to the victims of the Nov. 25 Jeddah flash flooding, everyone came to the same conclusion: A lack of disaster-management planning was a key component to the extent of the damage and loss of life.
Seventeen charity and civil society organizations met Wednesday evening at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) to organize their efforts after a few days of spontaneous but much appreciated mobilized work to collect and distribute donations in the affected areas. This followed a warning issued by the Makkah Governorate cautioning individuals and groups against donating haphazardly and instead directed them to give their donations through registered charity organizations, which are supposed to coordinate their distribution work with the Jeddah Governorate to ensure that the donations reach those who need them.
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Meanwhile, officials are summing up the toll of the flood, both in lives lost and properties damaged:
Official death toll in Jeddah flood placed at 109
Muhammad Humaidan | Arab NewsJEDDAH: With the recovery of one more body on Thursday, the death toll in the floods rose to 109, according to Spokesman of the Jeddah Civil Defense and Director of Disaster Management, Brig. Muhammad Al-Qarni told Arab News on Thursday. Al-Qarni put the number of missing at 39, adding that search operations were continuing. The civil defense provided 1,313 families are accommodated in furnished apartments on the past two days bringing the total of the families accommodated to 3,825 comprising 15,240 persons. The committee also distributed aid to 4,412 families comprising 17,4223 persons. A committee has also identified 5,029 properties and 4,664 damaged cars in the floods, he said. In related news, the Jeddah Department of Health Affairs has warned people against infections that might spread from waterlogged areas in flooded neighborhoods in a statement on Thursday. The department also warned against drinking water stored in below-ground or ground-level cisterns because they were likely to be contaminated by the floodwater, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
‘Misk Lake,’ the 2+ square kilometer sewage retention pond outside of Jeddah is high on the list of worries for Jeddawis. Millions of cubic meters of raw sewage pouring down the streets of Jeddah is not an attractive proposition. Those immediately downhill from the Lake are in greater danger. Saudi Gazette/Okaz report on the issue:
Misk Lake is a ‘time-bomb’, says Municipal official
Ibrahim AlawiJEDDAH – A leading member of the city’s municipality has warned that Misk Lake is a “time-bomb” that could drown the city in raw sewage in two hours if its banks are breached.
Bassam Akhdr, a member of the Jeddah Municipal Council and the Board of Directors of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, has emphasized that projects completed in the past have not helped to resolve the problem.
He described the lake as a “time-bomb” threatening three million people living in Jeddah. He said the lake could kill millions if its reserve bank collapses.
“The entire city will drown in less than two hours, Allah forbid.”
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The Lake is a danger to the city, one engineer responds, but let’s not get carried away. Safety can be assured, he says, by lowering the level of watery wastes. This, he claims, will not require the billions of Riyals that city officials are requesting, just some simple engineering solutions… which he doesn’t spell out.
Misk Lake remains a threat to city, warns expert
Muhammad Al-AjlanJEDDAH – A local environment expert has warned that Misk Lake poses a continual threat to residents and called on the Mayoralty to take urgent action.
Dr. Ali Bin Adnan Ishqi, Professor of Environmental Studies at King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah, said the sewage lake will continue to be a danger, especially when it rains and the water level rises.
Ishqi called on officials to take action before a tragedy occurs.
If there is rainfall with the same intensity and quantity as that of last Wednesday, the water level in the lake will definitely rise, he said.
To overcome the danger posed by the lake, Ishqi said the mayoralty must reduce the water level in the dam urgently.
Ishqi expressed astonishment at Jeddah Mayoralty officials asking for billions of riyals to solve the lake problem.
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‘Misk Lake’ has every appearance of being a ‘temporary’ solution to the sewage problems that confront Jeddah, but one that was allowed to become more or less permanent. It’s a blend of modern technology—particularly in monitoring—with archaic behavior—out of sight, out of mind. As both the city of Jeddah and the retention pond grew, however, the ‘out of sight’ part (as well as the ‘out of olfactory range’ factor) changed. The lake now represents a major hazard for the entire city.
Jeddah, it seems, needs a major, expensive, tedious, and disruptive retrofit of a modern sewage and drainage system. The corners cut when the Saudi economy was bad, the ‘commissions’ skimmed off of budgets, the looking the other way when it came to friends’ behavior are all now showing their weaknesses.
Investigations into the causes of the floods that wracked Jeddah last week are due to begin. In what is turning into the most comprehensive examination of Saudi infrastructure and the politics behind it, people are angry, the King is angry. It’s entirely possible that officials will be held accountable for their actions and inactions.
Arab News reports that there’s a rumor sweeping the country saying that Jeddah municipal officials are being prevented from leaving the country in advance of the inquiry. It’s only a rumor, however, which officials repudiate.
Probe to begin on Saturday
Hassna’a Mokhtar | Arab NewsJEDDAH: Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah ordered an inquiry into the causes of the Nov. 25 flash flooding in Jeddah. The commission in charge is set to begin its investigation on Saturday.
Following the announcement of the investigation, the municipality denied rumors that many of its employees are banned from traveling outside the Kingdom.
“It is absolutely not true,” Jeddah municipality spokesman Ahmed Al-Ghamdi told Arab News.
Unconfirmed reports by different media sources were cited on Tuesday saying that 70 percent of the municipality’s employees were banned from traveling outside Saudi Arabia.
One of the rumors said that Jeddah’s King Abdulaziz International Airport has a list with the names of people banned from traveling.
“This includes names of workers in the Jeddah municipality, other branches of the municipality, drainage system and some other construction companies,” said one report on the online Arabic-language forum alrassxp.com
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Arab News also runs a piece by Maha Akeel, who reports on her experience working with a charity group to help Jeddah residents. She reports on horror stories of the survivors—not all of whom ended up surviving! She notes that the media has played a useful role in reporting the tragedy and that many Saudis volunteered to help. Volunteerism is a growing phenomenon in the Kingdom, one that should be assisted wherever possible.
She closes her article strongly, reflecting the anger Jeddawis are feeling toward their government:
… People died in this tragedy because of negligence, mismanagement and corruption. The king’s orders to investigate the causes, rectify them, compensate the victims and hold those responsible for the tragedy, no matter who they are, is the kind of decision expected from a leader known for his courage, humaneness and sense of responsibility. We are confident that the investigating committee formed will carry out its duties — “immediately” as the king instructed, with all fairness. Let us hold those responsible accountable even if they have already left office. They should not be allowed to get away with murder. Justice delayed is better than no justice at all.
The disaster has people on tenterhooks over the possibility of a repetition:
Arab News also reports that Thieves prey on flood victims and that Many stores out of business, while Lawyers offer pro bono services to the distressed.
Saudi Gazette carries stories about the hardship Jeddah residents are facing following a less-than-stellar performance by municipal authorities.
Al-Basteen’s ‘lake’ may hold more drowned victims
Ibrahim AlawiJEDDAH – The district of Al-Basteen now has a giant pool of water which many residents fear holds the bodies of their missing relatives.
Residents here have gathered around it, waiting for it to dry, so that they can find out whether their family members have drowned. Civil Defense rescue teams have been called to start pulling out many decomposing bodies from the pool.
One of those thought to have drowned in the pool, which has become a breeding ground for mosquitoes and rodents, is Khedr Al-Salami. Al-Salami left his house on the morning of the rains to inspect the construction work at the mosque he was building for charity and in memory of his dead father.
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It also reports that those who lost vehicles to the flood are on their own when it comes to locating them:
If floods swept away your car, then find it yourself
Muhammad Al-AjlanJEDDAH – If you are one of those who lost their car in last week’s floods, then you have to look for it yourself at the many sites set up for flood-damaged vehicles.
If you are lucky enough, you will find someone who can guide you or tell you where these sites are. Okaz found 15 such sites. But even if you have the good fortune of finding your car, you have to pay SR500 to have it towed back home.
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Among the areas hardest hit were the ‘unplanned’ developments on the city’s outskirts. These, suggests former Jeddah mayor Nazih Nasief, are something that the municipality cannot control.
Actually, they can be controlled, but not easily and not by keeping everyone at some modicum of happiness. Clearing these districts would be extremely unpopular with those living in them for want of any other accommodation, to be sure. But when the entire city suffers as a result, perhaps they need attention and action.
Meanwhile, other Saudi cities are checking their own flood-preparedness, as Saudi Gazette/Okaz report:
I came across this interesting essay at Concurring Opinions law blawg. It concerns how formal law—laws written in books, enforced by police and the courts—intersects with informal law—behavior determined by culture and community. I think it’s worth reading in full.
As Saudi Arabia approaches codification of its laws as part of comprehensive legal reform, I think the essay has a lot to say about what’s going on. Popular or not, Saudi Arabia is undergoing a massive shift in its perspectives. Issues which a mere 50 years ago were deemed utterly unimportant—workers’ rights, womens’ rights, human rights—are now to the fore. What makes the transition particularly bothersome is that not all Saudis are yet on the same page. There are those whose ‘soft law’ remains based on patterns and systems that proved effective for thousands of years—patriarchy, patron/client relationships, honor/shame personal motivations—while others, the so-called ‘modernists’ or ‘secularists’ see a need for something better integrated with the rest of the world.
“Hard law, soft law and culture in the court room”
Grant McCracken, MITTeaching legal anthropology at Cambridge, I used to draw a distinction between hard law and soft law. It’s not a perfect distinction but some students found it clarifying.
Hard law is the body of rules that comes from the deliberations of jurists, legislators and the precedent of legal discourse. It is relatively formal, explicit, and well documented. It is subject to constant scrutiny, test and revision.
Soft law is the body of rules comes from a shifting consensus contained in social life. It prevails in traditional societies where, typically, there is no written record of what the community believes. Instead, there is a shared, deeply assumed set of notions about what is required, what is prohibited, and what punishment is called for when things go wrong. When soft law changes, it often does so by gradual and invisible consensus.
Hard law and soft law represent two kinds of order. Both help regulate social affairs, but clearly they operate in very different ways. As an anthropologist who studies contemporary culture, I am surprised how often these two forms of law are proverbial “ships passing.” We might expect soft law to proceed without a clear concept of the contents of hard law. But it is odd, I think, that hard law should be created and prosecuted as if soft law does not matter…or does not exist.
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Rumors of the impending collapse of a dam at ‘Misk Lake’, the sardonic name give to a waste containment pond outside of Jeddah, appear to be simply rumors. This Arab News reports says everything is in good shape at the lake, with three meters of headroom left above the water level.
The article does note an anomaly, however: Since last week’s rain, no tankers have been dumping sewage into the lake, as a precautionary measure. If not in the lake, where has that sewage been going? The article also points out that primarily African workers live in the shadow of the lake. They’re reluctant to move away as this is where their homes and jobs are.
Credit Arab News: Misk Lake
Sewage lake dam safe
Michel Cousins | Arab NewJEDDAH: Fears that the massive earth dam holding the sewage lake (Musk lake) in the hills east of Jeddah might burst and flood the city appear somewhat exaggerated.
An Arab News team went to investigate the dam on Tuesday and it appeared there was little to worry about. On Monday, the Civil Defense warned residents in Jeddah’s Al-Samr 3 district to evacuate their homes, fearing that the dam might burst. The warning sparked panic among residents elsewhere in eastern areas of the city.
The dam, some 20 meters wide, appeared in good repair. There were no breaches to be seen. What could be seen however, were a number of reporters, a couple of TV crews and carloads of sightseers. A bemused policeman in his vehicle paid little attention to the proceedings. No one was worried. No one was running away in panic, as had been the case the day before.
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The UAE’s The National writes about the issue and provides these details about the retention area:
About 800 tanker trucks dump 50,000 cubic metres [13 million US gallons] of sewage each day into the lake, which covers an area of 2.6 square kilometres.
Pollyanna-ish or simply clueless? Saudi Press Agency, in its coverage of the Jeddah floods, has managed to anger residents who didn’t actually get around to splashing happily in the rain and puddles, reports Arab News…
SPA makes Jeddawis dance with anger
Turki Al-Dakheel | Al-Watan, www.turkid.netThe Saudi Press Agency’s (SPA) reports on last Wednesday’s rain have angered Jeddah residents. “The SPA reporter found the people, particularly children and women, enjoying the heavy downpour that the city was not used to over the past many years.
Many of them headed to the Corniche beach to enjoy this happy and wonderful weather,” was how the news agency reported the catastrophe, as people struggled against the water that was engulfing their homes, claiming many lives.
This is how the official news agency reported the ravages of the unprecedented devastation that accompanied the torrential rain in Jeddah.
I wonder why SPA should stray far from the harsh realities in its reports. Even the minister of information said its coverage of the tragedy was humiliating to the families of victims.
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Frankly, the days of ‘official’ press agencies is gone, replaced by 24/7 satellite TV news, radio, the Internet, and even cell phones. Government do, perhaps, need a channel through which official texts, in full, can be published, but they do not need news organs to spin news events. That could be left to a free press, even a semi-free press.
I find it interesting how this Arab News piece, highlighting the flooding problems at KAUST, reference only foreign bloggers talking about their experiences. I guess there were no Saudi bloggers at the university writing it up!
In any event, construction of the university student housing seems to have been ‘less than optimal’. No word on what’s happened at laboratories and classrooms. Nor faculty or administration housing, for that matter…
Bloggers shine spotlight on campus flood
Hassna’a Mokhtar | Arab NewsJEDDAH: Students of the newly built King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) wrote in their blogs about floodwaters swamping the campus.
Blogger Richard Denny, (richarddenny.tumblr.com), reported that Nadhmi Al-Nasr, interim executive vice president of KAUST Administration and Finance, had sent out a note on the day of the rains warning everyone to stay home.
“Please note that due to the severe weather and flooding that we’re currently experiencing here at KAUST, there will be no classes and all our schools will be closed in conjunction with the offices. We’d request that you stay at home today,” Al-Naser informed the students and faculty.
Sobersaudi.com, a blog run by “Eric,” an engineering student currently enrolled at the university, described being surprised by the extent of the damage from an hours-long rainfall.
“This morning, after a rather romantic thunderstorm, all hell broke loose; along with a handful of houses,” he wrote.
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‘Misk Lake’ is a massive cess pool into which is dumped sewage and waste waters from the city of Jeddah. Much of Jeddah is not on a municipal sewage system, but instead relies on septic tanks and temporary storage of waste that is later pumped into tanker trucks which are emptied into the ‘Lake’. The lake, a natural depression, is surrounded by a several concentric berms and has a variety of pumps and desalination facilities to clean up the waste water sufficiently to permit its being channeled into the Red Sea. Not surprisingly, it’s difficult to find accurate descriptions of a sewage containment area in the media. The Saudi Geological Survey has done investigatory work on the Lake, but its website is currently being flagged as potential malware by Google!
The thought of a massive lake, filled with polluted water, laying upstream from the city is not a pleasant one, particularly for those living closest to it. The heavy rains of last week boosted the fear of overflow or a breach in the walls, so an advisory was issued to those living nearby. That advisory was taken as a danger alert by many, however, which lead to a blaze of rumors sweeping the city. Some of these reported that the dam had burst, creating more than a little panic. In a country where bad news tends to be downplayed by the media, rumors replace authoritative reporting.
Now, Saudi Gazette/Okaz are belatedly offering that reporting…
Advisory creates panic over Misk Lake
Abdulaziz GhazzawiJEDDAH – Prince Khaled Al-Faisal, Emir of Makkah, played down public fears Monday that the Misk Lake barrier was leaking, saying that the apparent leakage came from floodwaters leaking from a secondary evaporation lake connected with the 10-meter-high main defense barrier of Misk Lake.
The leakage did not come through the main defense barrier, and there is nothing alarming as of now, he said. The water level at Misk Lake has decreased, he said. It was believed to have risen to 14 meters, just 4 meters away from the top of the barrier.
The prince was speaking shortly after his inspection visit to the lake Monday.
He ordered close surveillance of Misk Lake in case of overflowing or leakage. Residents around the lake should be alerted to any danger that the lake may pose, Prince Khaled told authorities, vowing to rid Jeddah of its drainage nightmare forever.
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Note to the SGS: You might want to check why Google is blocking access to your site!
It is unfortunately the case in Saudi Arabia that those responsible for serious problems frequently escape culpability because of their connections, wasta. Usually it’s family connection, often connections through marriage, but sometimes through tribal origins, business relations, or simple friendship. The lack of accountability is a crippling factor for the Saudi economy and Saudi society. If nothing else, escape from accountability means that there are no ‘lessons learned’ from earlier problems.
According to this report from the official Saudi Press Agency, here reported by Saudi Gazette, this SOP (standard operating procedure) won’t be followed in the investigation into what went wrong in Jeddah last week. The King has named an investigatory committee, under the leadership of Pr. Khaled Al-Faisal, Governor of Mecca Province, to look into the disaster. Named to the panel are:
- 1- Chairman of Control and Investigation (CIP),
2- representatives from the Ministry of Interior including Chief of Civil Defense, Deputy of Makkah Emir, Chief of Administrative Intelligence, and Chief of Makkah Intelligence,
3- a high ranking official from General Intelligence,
4- Deputy Minister of Justice, and
5- Assistant Deputy of General Control Court.
I don’t find a forensic economist on the list, someone to track the money intended for flood mitigation and control, and the overall Jeddah sewage and drainage system. Did the moneys allocated for that go where they were supposed to go? Nor do I see any Civil Engineers listed. There was a physical failure of systems, not unlike the failure of flood control in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. And what about Geologists, Hydrologists, or even Cartographers?
King orders massive inquiry into Jeddah rainstorm disaster
JEDDAH – King Abdullah, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, has ordered a massive investigation into the Jeddah catastrophic rainstorm to establish the precise cause and try to determine responsibility for the death of over 100 people, a royal statement carried by Saudi Press Agency said Monday.
“The disaster was not a result of extraordinary or out-of-control hurricanes or floods as we know them. It was the result of a rainstorm that cannot be described as disastrous,” the King said in his order. Prince Khaled Al-Faisal, Emir of Makkah, will head the inquiry.
“As we bear responsibility before Allah,” to keep everybody in the country secure and safe, “It is our duty to firmly face this issue and find out those responsible, either government departments or individuals,” contributing to this disaster and firmly punish them for coming short of their duty, the decree said. “We are aware that we cannot overlook any shortcomings or mistakes from certain departments, and we have the courage to disclose them and deal with firmly,” the statement said.
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The Arabic daily Al-Watan is skeptical, however. It ran an op-ed, translated by Arab News, that throws a veil of doubt over how useful the committee will be:
Katrina of corruption
Ali Saad Al-Mosa | almosa@alwatan.com.saNo doubt, Jeddah municipal officials will issue a decree to set up a committee to investigate the disaster that struck the city last week. Every member of this committee will act as both a public defender and a prosecutor.
This committee will discuss the reasons behind the tragedy. First they will blame the sky for raining without warning. Then they will blame the floods for flooding. The dead, too, will be blamed for being responsible for their own tragedy, for daring to live in the low-lying Quwaizah district instead of the high-and-dry Al-Shatie. Why didn’t they listen to the previous night’s weather forecast? Why did they insist on living on ground floors? Why did they buy small cars instead of big ones like some officials who buy their vehicles from government money?
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