From Rulership to Leadership in the Arab World

PROLOGUE: The Whisper that Sparked a Flame Have you heard the one about the movie star and the son of a dictator in a room with a chartered accountant? It’s the story of how a spark led me to write this book. An American movie star lit the flame that led to setting this book into motion. More than 18 years passed between that moment in 2005 and when I felt the time was right. From the Arab Spring to the devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic, and even the war in Ukraine, the Arab world has evolved at a slower pace than its geographical neighbors, and one would need to be blind not to see it. Indeed, the thinking behind this book started in 2005. On a cold starlit night, I drove through the mountains from my home in Geneva and checked into a hotel in Davos. I was not new to Switzerland, nor to the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF), where I was headed, but I was always excited about this rarified global gathering of political and business elites, civil society organizations, and even movie stars. The packed snow made it easy to walk to the dinner gathering in my suede shoes. When I arrived, I spotted Richard Gere at a nearby table and couldn’t help but think of his shiny shoes in An Officer and a Gentleman. Having watched countless movies as a kid in Bahrain, I had attempted to create my own personal style amidst the conformity of bankers and financiers, but I was known for my vast collection of ties, not for my shoes. Even I, so often in meetings with people from contrasting cultures, could feel the momentousness of one the young Gamal Mubarak’s rare visits to Davos that crispy night in January 2005. Earlier that same year, his father, Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt, who had by this time ruled over the country for 24 years, would take measures to change the laws to grease the wheels of Gamal’s slippery ascension to the presidency. He was pushing through an amendment to Egypt’s constitution prohibiting political parties with fewer than five years in government and less than 5% representation in parliament to nominate a candidate. I looked neither like the lanky, dark-haired Gamal Mubarak, second son of Egypt’s president, nor like the silver fox full-head-of-hair Gere. With my shiny head, full mustache and faint Iraqi accent, I am a Bahraini. Although I was born there, I no longer live there, and yet I am probably more Bahraini than most Bahrainis who live there. Gamal was already being touted by the foreign press as the ascending ruler of Egypt to assure the power grip that his father, at that point in 2005, held for 24 of the 30 years before his dramatic fall in 2011. Was this appearance of the educated businessman who had become leader of Egypt’s National Democratic Party an inkling of what was to come six years down the road? Hosni Mubarak’s strong arm and military origins belied his desire to bring peace, as vice president to Anwar Sadat during the Sadat–Begin Camp David Accords. That night in Davos, I was skeptical of Gamal, seeing him as merely a product of the favoritism of his father, the iron-fisted ruler who held onto power through his tripartite system of civil government that included the control of the military, the intelligence services, and the police. It was my seventh consecutive visit to the Annual Meeting in Davos and I was one of four speakers in a session. I was there to represent the business voice because I was the elected vice chairman of the WEF’s Arab Business Council (ABC). The room was full of public figures from the Arab world and Arab business community. All the chairs were taken and latecomers were standing in the back. Of the four speakers, I was the first to arrive. I greeted the highly respected moderator, Ghassan Salamé, who asked me whether I wanted to be the first speaker. I told him that, since I was the only business voice, I wished to be the last. The room was packed and buzzing with anticipation, eager to hear the reformist voice of the younger Mubarak. Gamal was the second speaker, after Bassem Awadallah, followed by Salam Fayyad. All conversations focused on reforms in the Arab world. After listening to Gamal for over 15 minutes, the wave of disappointment in the room was palpable. When my turn finally came, I stood up and thanked Salamé for allowing me to speak last, remarking that the last speaker is usually in a bad position because everyone before them has covered the subject so they are forced to improvise. However, I said that was not the case on this occasion. I said that, like everyone else in the room, I had waited anxiously to hear the future head of the largest Arab country talk about his reformist vision but that, for the first 12 minutes of his 15-minute talk, he had spoken only to defend his father’s accomplishments over the prior 25 years. I concluded my address by saying that if the session proved anything, it showed that the Arab world was irrelevant to the rest of the world and would carry on that way as long as it had rulers and not leaders. “Mr. Mubarak,” I asked, as I ended my turn and looked directly at him, “How can we find our way from rulership to leadership in the Middle East? Will you give us a road map for the future?” After I spoke, Richard Gere stood up from his seat across the room, stopped at my table, leaned over, and whispered in my ear, “Khalid, you really must pursue this important question.”