Word: ebraheem
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...wonderful on paper," says Hasan al-Ebraheem, a former Kuwaiti Education Minister. "But it has had awful repercussions." By the time of Saddam's invasion, the cleavage between Kuwaitis and non-Kuwaitis had worsened considerably. Foreigners account for more than 60% of Kuwait's population and more than 80% of its work force. "Oil exacerbated the underlying tensions," says Saad Eddin Ibrahim, an Egyptian political sociology professor at the American University in Cairo. "The fantastic wealth made all Kuwaitis keener on emphasizing their Kuwaitiness because being Kuwaiti meant enormous privileges...
...attend the truly invasive societal changes contemplated for New Kuwait. If there is a consensus among Kuwaitis about anything, it is this: despite its vast wealth, Kuwait's society was sick, and not merely because of democratic failings or the poor treatment of expatriates. "At bottom," says Hasan al-Ebraheem, the former Education Minister, "much was rotted...
Harsh as it may seem, al-Ebraheem's assessment is common. Across the ideological spectrum -- from those who regularly opposed the ruling elite's every move to some of the elite's most prominent members -- the echo startles. "Ours was a culture of dependency," says Tareq al-Suwaidan, a leader of the opposition Islamic Trend movement. "We were the pampered product of an affluent society taken to the nth degree," says Minister of Planning Sulaiman Mutawa. "Everywhere," remarks Ali Jaber al-Sabah, a KPC managing director, "there was the spirit of ba'dain, of 'tomorrow.' Any real change...
...sheepskin, not for the knowledge. With employment assured, there is no need to actually learn anything if you are not self-motivated." Performance and accountability "are only the beginning of the new discipline we are going to have to inject into our school system," says Hasan al-Ebraheem. "We have to break up the university, create elite centers of training in specific skills like banking and business, and then we have to encourage those who cannot make it in those places to accept vocational training...
...unprecedented demographic make-over. As quickly as possible, Kuwait's population will be dramatically reduced, perhaps even halved. "How * do you get people to actually stop being lazy?" asks Ambassador Saud. "Why should anyone care about a real education, or making do with fewer handouts?" asks Hasan al-Ebraheem. The answer is that nothing will change unless everything changes. And the way for everything to change is to take a country that had more than 2 million people before August and recreate it with only 1 million. "The only way to exit the trap of dependency," says Tareq al- Suwaidan...