AMBASSADOR PULSES YOUNG KUWAITIS ON THEIR VISIONS

C O N F I D E N T I A L KUWAIT 000134 SIPDIS NEA/ARP E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/08/2020 TAGS: PGOV SOCI PHUM KWMN KU SUBJECT: AMBASSADOR PULSES YOUNG KUWAITIS ON THEIR VISIONS FOR THE FUTURE Classified By: PolCouns Pete O'Donohue for reasons 1.4 b and d ¶1. (C) Summary. At a February 2 luncheon at the CMR organized around the theme "Youth Vision for Kuwait in 2020," Ambassador pulsed fifteen Kuwaiti youth leaders, ranging from liberal to conservative, on what sort of Kuwait they will seek to create a decade from now. In response to her overture, the ten young women and five young men shared with Ambassador, DCM, and Emboffs their views on subjects including instituting a personal income tax, ceasing government-guaranteed employment, promoting adherence to the law, developing a national work ethic, and increasing staffing for the parliament so that it can play a more effective legislative and oversight role. Despite the many challenges facing this wealthy -- but increasingly divided -- society, most of the youth expressed optimism that a combination of youth activism and re-energized senior Kuwaiti leadership could effect meaningful change -- but there was no consensus on what that change should look like. Although by no means the consensus view, it is worth noting that one very articulate young man (a blogger) outlined a far darker vision, arguing that when surrounded by far larger and more powerful countries like Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, the question should not be what future for Kuwait in 2020, but whether there is a future for Kuwait as an independent state. End summary. =============== Illiberal liberals =============== 2 (C) Immediately reflecting one of Kuwait's more important societal divides, self-identified "liberals" at the table argued that many of Kuwait's ills could be cured if the "real" Kuwaitis (read: descendants of long-time settled "inside the walls" urbanites) reasserted themselves and returned the society to its glory days of the 60s and 70s. Conservatives politely demurred, instead suggesting a need for greater democracy and transparency (read: empowering the increasingly numerous conservatives and giving them better access to and oversight over state resources). (Note: While many Kuwaiti conservatives are tribal and many Kuwaiti liberals are urban, these are broad generalizations since there are urban conservatives from merchant families and liberal tribesmen. End note.) ¶3. (C) Although conversation throughout was exceedingly polite by American standards, some of the self-identified liberals insinuated rather clearly that they view rural, tribal Kuwaitis -- whose demographic majority in Kuwait continues to grow -- as part of the problem, not the solution, as they are net takers rather than contributors to the collective weal -- poorly educated, interested only in securing patronage, and seeking to Islamicize Kuwait in ways that will vitiate the nation's long tradition of tolerance and open debate. The conservative youths present responded to this approach cleverly but obliquely, affirming a desire for greater adherence to the law, to improve education, and to strengthen democracy and promote transparency. (Note: Left unsaid but not unrealized was the fact that Kuwait's electoral districts are gerrymandered so that the 200,000 tribal voters in the fourth and fifth constituencies elect only twenty MPs total whereas the 180,000 largely urban voters in the first, second, and third constituencies elect thirty. Similarly, wealthy and connected liberal merchant families have benefited disproportionately from government projects and contracting, reaping huge rewards where more marginalized tribals cannot compete. End note.) =============== Is our children learning? =============== ¶4. (C) The youth leaders agreed that Kuwait's present education system was in disarray, having declined from its 1970s and 1980s heyday when it was dominated by well-educated Palestinian teachers who were expelled after the 1990 Gulf War and replaced by less-capable Egyptian and Kuwaiti instructors. (Note: The Education Ministry is an arena for significant liberal vs. conservative conflict because the GOK usually appoints a liberal to head the ministry, while its rank and file is largely comprised of conservatives. Conservative MPs have several times attempted to remove the minister through no-confidence votes, most recently in 2008 when tribal Islamist MP SAAD Al-Shareea grilled then-Education Minister Nouriya Al-Sabih, who survived the grilling. End note.) Many wealthy liberal families have fled the public school system in favor of private schools -- in contrast, a generation ago almost all Kuwaitis attended public schools. Here all the youth agreed more focus and leadership from the government was necessary to improve standards -- although one conservative was visibly taken aback when it was suggested by a liberal woman that the move to segregate public education by gender was a manifestation of the growing backwardness and decay in the system. =============== Economic proposals ================ ¶5. (C) Proposals for instituting a personal income tax and ceasing government-guaranteed employment were notions that found favor among the young business professionals (albeit with the full recognition that such unpopular options would be all but impossible to achieve),most of whom expressed frustration with a Kuwaiti business climate that discouraged entrepreneurship and fostered a reliance on government largesse. A personal income tax might force the GOK to be more accountable to the citizenry, suggested Hessa Al-Hmaidi, a recent AUB graduate who helped found the Sout Al-Kuwait ("Voice of Kuwait") NGO in 2008 in an effort to educate Kuwaitis about their constitution and its protections for personal freedoms. Najla Al-Ghanim, chairwoman of the Gulf Consult company, agreed that such a tax would motivate the GOK to improve the country's poor electricity infrastructure, a shortcoming which greatly inhibits private sector growth. Ceasing government-guaranteed employment would generate a larger, more motivated pool of Kuwaiti labor available to private sector companies, argued Ahmad Al-Hamad, the managing director of the Kuwait China Investment Company, who also suggested that all Kuwaiti college graduates be required to work for one year in a Kuwaiti ministry as a means of putting their free education to work for bettering the country. =============== Political proposals =============== ¶6. (C) Several of the young political activists supported increasing staffing for the parliament -- so that it can play a more effective legislative and oversight role -- and developing a national work ethic. Abdullah Al-Awadhi, chief of staff for female MP Aseel Al-Awadhi, advocated reform of the system under which parliamentary staffers are selected and paid. Abdullah explained that, currently, MPs must select their dozen-odd staff members from among the GOK ministries and that these staff members then continue receiving their salary from their home ministry while adding a small bonus from the funds allotted to each MP by the GOK for staffing. He complained that his MP drafted a bill to reform the system so that each MP gets a larger staff allowance and pays each staff member's full salary, but that Speaker Jassem Al-Khorafi squelched it. Abdullah argued that parliamentary staffs would be more effective if MPs could hire professionals with legislative skills from outside the ministries and pay their full salaries. ¶7. (C) Several of the luncheon guests also called for more Secularism (this proved controversial),while there was broader consensus on the need for a better national work ethic, and strengthening of the rule of law. Rana Kamshad, secular head of the Junior Achievement-type NGO Injaz ("Achievement"),called for keeping religion out of political debate while offering one of the more optimistic assessments of the potential of non-Hadhar, tribal youth from Jahra. Recent architecture graduate Aseel Al-Yacoub called for a stronger national work ethic and harsher penalties for Kuwaiti citizens and police who violate or fail to uphold the law. This final recommendation was echoed by Al-Hmaidi, who recounted a recent experience at Kuwait International Airport when a Kuwaiti security officer ordered three Indian men to move so that Al-Hmaidi -- a Kuwaiti -- could skip to the front of the line. When Al-Hmaidi -- in her account -- angrily criticized the officer for denying the Indians their rightful place in line and treating them as non-persons, the officer dismissed her complaint and insisted that he was acting appropriately to favor a Kuwaiti over foreigners. At the luncheon, Al-Hmaidi also criticized Kuwait's aging liberal leaders -- specifically Kuwait Democratic Forum Secretary General Abdullah Al-Naibari -- for neither training the next generation of liberal leadership nor effectively supporting young liberal candidates in their campaigns for parliament. =============== Irrational exuberance and rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic? =============== ¶8. (C) Although conservatives often found it difficult to get a word in edgewise, Ahmed Al-Safi received strong support when he asserted that what was important was that the youth of Kuwait today feel empowered to change their future, to make it better, and simply need the older generation to have confidence in them. Mohammed Al-Yousifi a prominent liberal blogger, was the sole exception to this. He noted mordantly that Kuwait was a tiny country surrounded by far larger and more powerful neighbors (he laid out three pieces of pita bread and a grain of rice on the table as a rough map to demonstrate his point). Clearly frustrated with the direction he sees the country headed in, Al-Yousifi opined that the question isn't what kind of future Kuwait will have, but whether it will have a future at all. Looking at the regional and domestic trends, he shocked the table by suggesting openly that as a reasonable, rational individual and potential future husband and father, he was not sure he could discharge his duties to a putative future family except by making contingency plans so as to be able to pursue a life elsewhere in the West. Not to contemplate the possibility of a post-Kuwait future, he argued, was simply irresponsible. =============== Comment =============== ¶9. (C) The luncheon guests' collective aspirations for a 2020 Kuwait characterized by a more responsible, more merit-based society may represent the triumph of hope over experience. Kuwait's present tightly-knit society, based on a comfortable revenue stream and long traditions of respect for family position and personal connections over merit has long tended to favor "who you are" over "what you do." Changing these mores will be difficult and take time. Moreover, the Kuwaiti youths' focus on consolidating their own demographic's position and hold on power -- rather than on reaching across the aisle -- may foreshadow that this generation -- like previous ones -- may become so engaged in liberal-conservative infighting and self-serving squabbles over access to Kuwait's wealth that they too fail to provide Kuwait with a strategic vision for reform. A sad pattern here is that young Kuwaitis return from their overseas education filled with enthusiasm and ideas which are quickly depleted in this essentially self-satisfied, wealthy, and remarkably parochial society, which is perhaps the closest thing to a bourgeois society in the Gulf. End comment. ********************************************* ********* For more reporting from Embassy Kuwait, visit: visit Kuwait's Classified Website at: http://www.intelink.sgov.gov/wiki/Portal:Kuwa it ********************************************* ********* JONES