Jamal Khashoggi: Insider into outsider

On 2 October, Jamal Khashoggi, dual language journalist citizen of Saudi Arabia, went with his fiancée Hatice Cengiz, to the Saudi embassy in Istanbul. Their intention was to obtain a promised form that would confirm Jamal’s divorce from his former wife and allow him to marry Ms. Cengiz. Jamal had already arranged to buy a house in Istanbul where they would live after their marriage. Jamal Khashoggi went into the Saudi embassy while Ms. Cengiz waited for him outside the embassy.

A few days before that date, on 28 September, Jamal had come to the embassy to fill the necessary forms for the recognition of his divorce and he was asked to come back for the form. Before his second visit to the embassy, a squad of certified killers had arrived in the Saudi Arabia embassy, waiting for Jamal Khashoggi.

Jamal was born in Medina to a wealthy non-royal family of Arab-Turkish extraction. He studied journalism in the United States of America and returned to his country to practise his profession. He was part of the elite and he moved in the circle of intellectuals, businessmen as well as the royalty. He covered much of the turbulence that visited Afghanistan, Pakistan and he reported on the Arab Spring and its ultimate failure. All the time though, Saudi Arabia was his focus and his love.

Saudi Arabia has a population of 20,000,000 of whom under 30s make up two-third of the population. According to Jamal Khashoggi, these young men and women want what all the world wants: more opportunities, more transparency and more stability. Jamal was a palace insider and one time adviser to powerful Prince Turki al-Faisal who had served as Saudi’s intelligence chief and ambassador to the USA and the UK.

Along with Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal Khashoggi was to start a new satellite channel, like al-Jazeera, in Bahrain, in partnership with Bloomberg. It was closed within hours for doing an interview with an opposition politician in Bahrain under Saudi pressure.

In 2003, he was appointed editor of al-Watan but was sacked after two months on the job. Still later, on the same job, he lasted three years and again was sacked for publishing a poem some clerics did not approve of.He was critical of Arab governments and shared a view with Osama bin Laden that absolute monarchy is obsolete in this modern era of democracy. He felt that there were only two ways to overthrow corrupt Arab governments: “by infiltrating the political system through its institutions or, by violently overthrowing the depraved ruling cliques.”

The rise of King Salman and the emergence of his son Mohammed bin Salman changed things. The Prince needed to stamp his authority on the country. Soon, arrests were rampant of intellectuals, clerics, hundreds of princes and business tycoons, journalists and social media stars including billionaire Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal. These were friends and colleagues of Khashoggi.

He knew that there were members of the Council of Senior Scholars (Ulema) who expressed backward views such as Shiites are not Muslims or a Muslim ruler needs not consult to come to decisions. Yet Prince Mohammed bin Salman had made promises to the country. He said he would make the country more open and more tolerant. He would embrace social and economic reforms and address things that held back the progress of the country. He also promised to crush extremists.

Instead of doing these things he had women’s rights activists, including those advocating women driving, thrown into jail a month before women driving was allowed. Although Khashoggi loved the country, he could not ignore the abuses, the repression and mistakes of the government. He was also critical about the way Prince Salman went about fighting corruption in the country. According to Khashoggi, corruption in Saudi Arabia was not limited to a bribe in return for a contract, or expensive gift for the family member of a government official or Prince, or use of a private jet charged to government.

Corruption made senior officials and princes become billionaires as contracts are either enormously inflated or at worst, a mirage. He gives the example of a 2004 Jeddah city project “where a massive sewer project was really a series of manhole covers across the city with no actual pipes underneath. I, as the editor of a major paper at the time, can say that we knew, and we never reported on it.”

Under King Salman and Prince Mohammed bin Salman “open, fact-based discussion about important geopolitical issues” had become impossible. Intellectuals were being shamed publicly. Even those who agreed with Khashoggi’s views critical of the government would advise him that it was not the time to express such views. Everyone should support the reforms.

Jamal Khashoggi read the writing on the wall. He left Saudi Arabia for exile in the United States of America. There he got a column on the Washington Post, through which he wrote about the Arab world and of Saudi Arabia. He knew he was making enemies but he was careful about offers of high level jobs tempting him to come back to Saudi Arabia. He was, he said, afraid of being thrown into jail!

After three hours of waiting for Jamal to come out of the embassy, Ms. Cengiz became worried. He asked an official of the embassy the whereabouts of Jamal Khashoggi. The answer she got alarmed her! The official said that Khashoggi had left. Maybe she did not notice. She immediately called a friend of Jamal, an advisor to the Turkish President.

Later, a Khashoggi look-alike had been seen on CCTV walking away from the back door of the Saudi embassy. The assassination of Jamal Khashoggi was well-planed including a look-alike to confuse the narratives of his death.

Western countries have mouthed mild criticisms of the Saudi government but nothing more. Saudi Arabia’s multi-billion dollar arms deals with them – Canada, France, Great Britain, Germany and the United States of America – would not let them act against the Saudi government. But Jamal Khashoggi would not have died in vain. Saudi Arabia would be shocked into change by his death. He is survived by four children from his first marriage.
bankole.omotoso@elizadeuniversity.edu.ng