Collective Amnesia

Reading the latest book (Chicago) by the Egyptian novelist Alaa al-Aswany recently one section stood out from the rest: a conversation between an Egyptian academic, Muhammad Salah, and his first love Zeinab. Dr Salah had left Egypt at an early age to pursue a PhD in America and went on to carve out a successful career for himself at the University of Illinois, leaving Zeinab behind in Egypt to idle away her days at the ministry of planning.

However, several decades later and driven by a failed marriage to his American wife, acute homesickness and a deep sense of nostalgia for his homeland, Salah plucks up the courage to contact Zeinab, whereupon his nostalgic view of the Egypt he left behind in the 1950s comes face-to-face with the harsh realities of modern life in many Arab countries.

“Egypt is living its worst days” Zeinab tells him. “Everything has changed for the worst. Reactionary ideas are spreading like the plague. Can you imagine that I am the only female Muslim in the department of planning, out of fifty employees, who is not wearing the veil? … Egyptians have given up on justice in this world, so they are they are waiting for it in the next.”

The growth in religious symbolism here in Jordan is a subject that has caught my attention for some time now. The most obvious expression of this is a perceived increase in the number of girls wearing the Hijab (headscarf), particularly the younger generation. In the absence of any hard statistical data, a fairly rough way of gauging the situation is to talk to university lecturers, most of whom agree there has been an increase. The decision of Muslim women to wear the Hijab is a personal choice and I’m all for that. However, I believe this phenomenon reflects much deeper societal fault lines.

For example, the growing religiosity appears to have little to do with religion in any meaningful sense of the word, i.e. an inward journey to improve the self. Neither does it appear to be driven by Qu’ranic injunctions on modesty. Many women who wear the Hijab do so in combination with skin tight jeans and tops, not to mention layers of make-up. And it’s not just an issue of the Hijab. In a recent column for the Independent, Robert Fisk noted that “civil "servants" and government officials are often scrupulous in their religious observances – yet they tolerate and connive in rigged elections, violations of the law and prison torture.” The same article also recalled how doctors abandoned their patients at a Cairo hospital to attend prayers during Ramadan. The same phenomena can be found throughout the region, a kind of mass religious façade in which the meaning of Islam has become associated with its physical representation, however threadbare that may be.

The character in al-Aswany’s novel, Zeinab, puts this phenomena down to repression, poverty and having no hope in the future, describing as a “ collective depression accompanied by religious symptoms.” Driving this sense of collective amnesia has been the failure of Arab regimes to introduce democratic institutions, good governance, a thriving civil society and clear national goals. In the absence of effective governance, including a lack of checks and balances on power, the whole concept of citizenship, as a person enjoying equal rights and obligations to co-citizens under the law, has been undermined. Under these circumstances the retreat into religious symbolism is perhaps a way of rationalizing both the present and the future in repressive societies where cronyism and corruption rein supreme and where patronage and connections, rather than merit, are the key factors which determine social mobility.

Nevertheless, it can hardly be a sign of healthy and advancing societies but more a descent into mass schizophrenia.

lighting up Jerusalem

Photo: Pavel Wolberg/EPA

No politics here, just a magical picture of Palestinian children lining the streets in Ramadan as worshipers make their way to the al-Aqsa Mosque. Light upon Light!

Slavery by another name

The Jordanian press reported today that the Cabinet has introduced new regulations governing domestic workers. Under the new measures, the workers will be entitled to: a 14 day annual leave and 14days of paid ‘sick leave’, be allowed to contact home once a month at their employer’s expense, and work no more than ‘10 hours’ per day – 10 hours per day! Very generous that in a country where the public sector shuts down at three and even earlier during Ramadan. The new benefits also include a clause guaranteeing religious freedom.

And in return for these generous benefits, the employees will be expected to – and I quote: “...do their job with utmost integrity and faithfulness respect the privacy of their workplace and maintain its contents, not reveal the secrets of the house, respect the employer's traditions and culture, and not leave the house without the employer's permission”.

And:

“If a domestic helper runs away from her workplace, the employer will not be obligated to fulfill any financial obligations to the worker, nor will the employer bear the expense of sending the domestic helper back to her country.”

Yes, and we all know what that means: the worker will be locked up in a police station until someone coffs up the repatriation fees.

The new regulations come in the wake of a string of allegations regarding the plight of domestic workers in Jordan. The case of 150 Filipino workers who took refuge in their embassy in Amman in 2008 from abusive employers drew international media attention after the Philippine government placed a temporary ban on its citizens travelling to work in Jordan. The crimes committed against them included non-payment of wages, physical abuse and even rape, not to mention overwork, the restriction on mobility, communication and isolation.

The media attention was no doubt embarrassing for the government – which had never showed any real initiative to address the concerns before – and I guess placed some pressure on it to finally act. After all, human rights are supposed to be key issues under the terms of the FTAs with the EU and the US – but regardless do not have appeared to have had much leverage in Jordan’s case.

Although the new regulations are to be welcomed and follow changes in the Labour Law that protect the rights of foreign workers, in reality, like most things in Jordan, they will fall down on implementation. We are told that a new committee will be formed to enforce the regulations, comprising labour ministry officials and representatives from the police and the Non-Jordanian Domestic Helpers Affairs Committee. But what mechanisms will be put in place to enforce such regulations? None have been announced to date. Or is it just a straw man to stave off the attention of the media and international donors?

Human Rights Watch has recommended a couple of proposals. First, that all domestic workers appear at the labour ministry “in the presence of the home owner within the first month of work to ensure she is aware of her rights and duties under her employment contract and under this regulation, of which she should receive a copy in a language she understands.” Secondly, that the police and others investigate cases “where there is credible evidence of abuse, and not only where there is an official complaint.”

This is highly unlikely for a number factors: lack of institutional capacity, lack of will, and lingering cultural norms which view this form of servitude as acceptable (just look at the Gulf slave economies). Also, by the very nature of their work, domestic servants are employed in private households concealed from prying eyes. The typical experience of a domestic worker arriving in Jordan goes something like this: they are collected from the agencies and whisked off to houses, rarely to be seen again, unless carrying shopping in a supermarket, pushing prams in the shopping malls or minding the children in the Nadi while the mothers drink coffee. Once in the houses they are at the full mercy of their employers and despite the new 'protections' this is the way things will remain as long as a culture persists in which a modern day form slavery is widley seen as acceptable.

Is a new press law in the pipeline ?

Just a week or so ago the Jordanian interior minister, Nayef al-Qadi, launched an attack on segments of the Jordanian media for “unbalanced reporting” and accused some of being agents on the payroll of foreign powers (see post below).

The media has come under official scrutiny lately for a number of issues, including its coverage of the Aqaba port strike, the government’s alleged revoking of Palestinian citizenship, and its sharp criticism of the performance of the current parliament, among others. But although the minister lambasted some segments of the media, he nevertheless qualified his comments by stating that the government had no intention of restricting freedom of expression.

But it seems the media doesn’t believe him. This week the press has been rife with speculation that the government is seeking to once again redraft articles of the press and publications law. And judging by the reaction of the Jordan Press Association’s president (though not regarded for being a fierce proponent of press freedom), it does not appear that any future amendments are aimed at easing restrictions. It is difficult to say exactly what’s going on here. It could be that the minister's comments and the subsequent ‘leaks’ concerning a possible revisit of the press laws are merely a tactic to keep the media in line. Who knows?

The press and publications law itself has been the subject of heated debate for many years as activists have lobbied to repeal clauses in the 1998 law allowing for the imprisonment of journalists. Finally in March 2007, the clauses were abolished but only after a fierce battle with the lower house which wanted to retain them and instead settled for an increase in fines of up to $40,000 for violations relating to defaming religion, offending religious prophets, inciting sectarian strife or racism, slandering individuals, and spreading false information or rumours.

The changes signified a positive step forward but were hardly ground breaking. The law still provides the government with wide discretionary powers to withdraw licenses and close down publications/broadcast media, while journalists and writers can still face imprisonment under the penal code. All of these factors serve to keep editors in line and engender self-censorship among journalists.

Recent incidents documented by Reporters Without Borders (Jordan ranks 128 out of 173 countries in the press freedom index) include:



6 July 2009 - Government closes Amman bureaux of two Iranian satellite TV stations
3 November 2008 - Newspaper editor freed on bail after being held for five days by state security court
11 October 2007 - Ex-legislator gets two years in prison for online criticism of government corruption


Also, in June this year a court sentenced poet Islam Salhan to one year in prison and a $15,000 fine on charges of defaming Islam.


So what possible changes to the law could be on the government’s agenda? We’ll have to wait and see …

Qadi censures media for ‘unbalanced’ reporting

During a meeting a couple of days ago a well known Jordanian commentator explained to me that, contrary to the opinions of some US diplomats in Amman, Jordanian interior minister Nayef Qadi was a reformist figure. I did not comment at the time as frankly I did not have enough information on Qadi, beyond the fact that he has served in several Jordanian governments and was responsible – under instructions – for presiding over the expulsion of Hamas leaders from Jordan in the late 1990s.

But after reading Qadi’s attacks on the Jordanian press in today’s papers he certainly does not appear to be pushing the boundaries of reform, but rather resembles a typical example of the old guard of Arab officials (and most of the new for that matter) who are simply unable to countenance any form of criticism.

In this case, Qadi’s beef with the media relates to the coverage of the recent actions by the kingdom’s security forces towards striking workers in the port of Aqaba. The Jordanian media generally took the side of the workers and accused the security forces - and by extension the interior minister himself - of heavy handed tactics in dealing with the dispute, which left several striking workers injured and others detained. Qadi accused the media of only reporting one side of the story, claiming that the protesters threw stones at the security forces and threatened the families of other workers. This may or may not be true, but no evidence was presented to back up the claim.

But rather strangely and frankly quite comically, Qadi then proceeded to stray into the realms of conspiracy theories and launched a general and rather muddled attack on the media – tame at the best of times - by accusing some journalists of being “ agents of foreign agendas” and of “accepting funding from suspicious foreign parties”. Mmmn… Who might these foreign parties be I wonder? Maybe the same ones that the government readily takes money (read: begs)from every year to shore up the budget? Of course, he didn’t say, that would require actually presenting some evidence to back up the accusations.

The “agents of foreign agendas” theme is a a rather tired and common method, not just in Jordan but throughout the Arab world, of attempting to silence criticism of governments and officials. The region’s leaders would prefer journalists to function in the same manner as the Arab poets of old, extolling the virtues of the tribe and its leaders – or in this case the government and its ministers – and follow the example of arguably the greatest Arab poet in the panegyric genre, al-Mutanabbi (10th Century). This line of thinking can be clearly discerned in Qadi’s comments to the media yesterday, particularly this one when he called on the media to:

“‘Stop receiving "instructions from outside the country’, urging them to defend the nation's interests and political stands’ ... and avoid "negative" practices including inaccuracy and biased reporting’. “

Well, it's not really the function of the media to “defend the nation’s interests and political stands”, but rather to examine the policies and practices of the government – including towards striking workers – and assess whether or not these policies are conducive to the public interest and serve the good of the country. The function of the media – to quote the Israeli journalist Amira Hass – is precisely to “monitor the centres of power”. In terms of the so-called ‘negative practices’, what the minister is referring to is usually a direct consequence of the government’s refusal, or inability, to deliver accurate and timely information to journalists. Access to information and the poor institutional capacity of governmental departments are among the main obstacles hindering journalists from pursuing their trade in Jordan.

Although Qadi qualified his remarks by stating that this would not result in any restrictions on the media, the fact that his comments are characteristic of a mindset throughout the Arab world that regards any form of criticism as a personal attack. Only last month the Palestinian Authority banned al-Jazeera from operating in the West Bank following the broadcasting of remarks by Farouk Kaddoumi – the secretary general of Fatah’s central committee, alleging that Mahmoud Abbas and Mohammad Dahlan plotted with Israeli officials to murder Yasser Arafat. Instead of challenging Kaddoumi to produce his evidence, Fatah responded by banning al-Jazeera, by far the most popular and trusted news source in the Arab world.


Likewise, instead of leveling vague accusations at the Jordanian media for its coverage of the port workers strike in Aqaba, and veering into the realms of fantasy, why didn’t Qadi do the sensible thing and challenge the media’s coverage in an op-ed outlining the government’s version of events and countering the media’s criticism point-by-point? Such an approach would not only have increased the levels of accountability and transparency in government decision-making, but would also have furthered the so-called reform agenda and a culture of open debate.

Lifting the veil

An interesting piece of news in the Jordanian Arabic press this week relates to the arrest of 50 suspects who used the veil as a cover to carry out 170 crimes, ranging from shoplifting and stealing mobile phones to bag snatching and armed robbery. Amusingly, 27 of those arrested were men (and nearly all were Jordanian citizens). I’m not sure how they eventually tracked them down, maybe by their handbags and shoes, who knows?

Aside from the debate raging around gender equality issues in France and elsewhere, which carries with it a whole set of cultural and religious minefields, those wishing to ban the veil would probably garner more support if they confined their arguments to issues of crime and security. In the age of CCTV, what better cover is there for criminals than the veil?

Shooting yourself in the foot

AP Photo



The reaction of the Palestinian Authority to the explosive allegations made by PLO political section head Farouq Qaddoumi at a press conference in Jordan last week accusing Mahmoud Abbas of conspiring to kill Yasser Arafat has been depressing, yet entirely predictable.

Instead of challenging Qaddoumi to produce his evidence, the Fateh leadership has followed the well trodden path of other Arab regimes by punishing the messenger and closing down al-Jazeera’s operations in the West Bank, which was just one of many channels that broadcast the allegations.

The PA leadership has a long history of tensions with al Jazeera, which it has often accused of being a mouthpiece for Hamas. These claims, however, do not hold much weight and the real reasons are a lot more basic, i.e. that Arab leaders are simply unable to countenance any form of media criticism even when their reactions prove to be completely counterproductive. This is the case here. Aside from issues of freedom of speech and calling into question the PA leadership’s commitment to democratic values (slight at best), the decision just doesn’t make any sense.

Al-Jazeera remains by far the most popular and trusted news source in the Arab world. In addition to devoting a substantial proportion of its airtime to Palestinian affairs, the channel has arguably done more to promote a balanced view of the Palestinian issue worldwide than the Arab League has in its entire history. As such, it is held in deep regard by the majority of Palestinians. So why on earth would Abbas think it was a good idea to silence it and why do Arab leaders in general continue to undermine their own scant legitimacy through self defeating attempts to silence the media? There are no easy answers here, but fear, insecurity and overblown egos feature largely in the mix.

As such, not only will the PA’s actions further undermine its legitimacy, they will also add weight to Qaddoumi’s remarks and fuel conspiracy theories concerning the nature of the Arafat’s death and Abbas’ exact relationship with Israel. Furthermore, it also sends the wrong signal to the US concerning the possibility of a future Palestinian state based on the rule of law and democratic freedoms. At the same time it will give plenty of ammunition to those forces in both the US and Israel who argue that a Palestinian state would create more problems than it would solve, by adding yet another repressive dictatorship to an already problematic region. Despite its exposure of Israeli war crimes during the offensive in Gaza, al Jazeera continues to operate freely in Israel.

An interesting side take on this story was also the Jordanian government’s need to usher a quick apology to the PA for Qaddoumi’s remarks. The point here being that given the authoritarian nature of Arab regimes, the fact that he was even allowed to utter these allegations on Jordanian soil may imply the government had given its tactic approval. Fair enough, it’s understandable why Jordan would want to disassociate itself from the remarks, but nevertheless is indicative of the petty mindset of regimes throughout the Arab world that are struggling to come to terms with the concept of free speech and new media.