Singaporean dark horse in IOC race campaigns on promise of change (JMD on Play the the Game)

Singaporean dark horse in IOC race campaigns on promise of change

By James M. Dorsey  on Play the Game

03 September 2013

Print version

Singaporean Ng Ser Miang is one of six candidates in the race for the post as the next IOC president. Photo: Singapore YOG 2010/Flickr

There is more to Ng Ser Miang’s assertion that it’s time an Asian heads the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

As the 64-year old Chinese-born Singaporean national campaigns to succeed Belgium’s Jacques Rogge as head of the IOC when its executive committee meets in Buenos Aires on September 10, Mr. Ng projects himself as an agent of change in line with the winds of the times. His proposed reforms of the 119-year old organization promise what he terms ‘a fresh perspective.’ Were Mr. Ng, an IOC vice president since 2009, to succeed against the odds, he would be  the first non-Westerner to head one of the world’s oldest and most powerful sports associations, symbolizing the perceived shift of global power from West to East.

A self-made wealthy businessman who operates Singapore’s largest supermarket chain, Mr. Ng, considered a dark horse in the IOC race, has said that he would cut the costs of staging Olympic games, look at downsizing the size and scale of tournaments, enhance cooperation with national Olympic committees, empower his deputies and staff, tackle doping and illegal betting and focus on youth in the developing world.

Speaking to journalists, Mr. Ng, a former competitive sailor and Singapore’s non-resident ambassador to Norway, asserted that the handing over of the IOC’s reins to an Asian would be "important not just symbolically but for the values they can bring to the table as well, when we talk about universality, different value systems, different cultures, different ways of looking at issues and challenges, which also means that you have different solutions, coming from different angles and different perspectives. I believe that's going to be very, very useful to the movement and very important to the movement in future."

In a crowded field in which Thomas Bach of Germany is widely viewed as the front runner, Mr. Ng is believed to be second followed by Puerto Rican banker Richard Carrion. Ukrainian pole-vault champion Sergey Bubka, Denis Oswald of Switzerland and International Boxing Federation head CK Wu of Taiwan.

Responding to protest
Whether by design or default, key elements of Mr. Ng’s agenda respond to widespread dissent, defiance and lack of confidence in institutions expressed in mass protests across the globe from Chile and Brazil to Occupation Wall Street in the United States to Istanbul’s Taksim Square, the popular revolts rocking the Middle East and North Africa, and demonstrations in Indonesia.

Sports, athletes and fans have often been at the center of these protests, suggesting that international and national sports associations cannot ignore the demands for change, involving increased transparency and accountability as well as greater sensitivity to social issues and less incestuous affinity with often autocratic leaders or elected officials whose majoritarian concepts of democracy are illiberal.

The cost of hosting the World Cup and the Olympic Games in Brazil in 2014 and 2016 cut to the core of frustration that erupted on the streets of Brazilian cities earlier this year. References of various Brazilian protesters to the World Cup and world soccer body FIFA asserting that the tournament perpetuates their country’s urban problems, disenfranchise voters by depriving them of a say in the use of public funds and tax dollars, dislocates large population groups and establishes FIFA as a state within a state should serve as a wake-up call.

Mr. Ng’s proposals cater to those concerns. They also address widespread unease with the power of financial muscle in the world of sports expressed in continued questioning of the awarding of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar almost three years after it won the hosting rights. Qatar’s ability and willingness to allocate far larger sums to its bid campaign as compared to its competitors has raised the stakes for would be hosts, particularly in the developing world, that do not have the funds to wage expensive campaigns and invest heavily in infrastructure that may not benefit their countries in the long term.

With youth playing a major role in the wave of protests that have marked the first three years of the second decade of this century, Mr. Ng’s plan to significantly expand the IOC’s Olympic youth development centers in developing countries targets the young  that are at the core of overriding dissent and defiance. His reaching out to grassroots is akin to the activities of the Asian Football Development Project (AFDP) set up by Jordanian Prince Ali Al Hussein, who as FIFA vice president is another reformer within the international sports world.

Mr. Ng chaired the inaugural Youth Olympic Games, which he co-founded, in Singapore in 2010, and was a driving force behind the city-state's rise from a sporting backwater to a regional hub with Formula One in its portfolio. His office in the yet to be completed $1.3 billion Singapore’s Sports Hub that includes a 55,000 seat stadium projects the country’s ambition to become a global sports center, a goal it pursues without the Gulf’s pomp and circumstance.

A double-edged sword
Mr. Ng’s promise to root out corruption, doping and illegal betting is boilerplate for any candidate for high office in a world that has and is wracked with repeated scandals. For the Singaporean, this pledge is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, he represents a nation that ranks among the world’s top five least corrupt and that prides itself on its tough anti-corruption attitude. On the other hand, Singapore has long been home to syndicates at the heart of international soccer match-fixing scandal and was seen to be slow in cracking down on them.

Mr. Ng’s style of quiet diplomacy reflects Singapore’s low key approach to sports. As the IOC’s point man on the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Mr. Ng has been seeking to ensure that the tournament is not marred by recent Russian anti-gay legislation. “In such cases where diplomacy is at work, we should limit to the effectiveness of the quiet diplomacy," Mr. Ng says.

That is likely to be his approach to reform within the IOC. Mr. Ng has pledged to spend in his first six months half a day with each of the 115 national federations after which he would gather them for a retreat that would focus on tackling key issues confronting the IOC. If he unexpectedly wins, Mr. Ng has his work cut out for him.

---

James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture, and the author of The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer blog.

Saudi Arabia to allow women to compete in London Olympics

Dalma Rushdi Malhas, Saudi Arabia's likely female Olympic athlete

By James M. Dorsey

Saudi Arabia, in a sudden turnabout has lifted its ban on women athletes competing in international tournaments little more than a week after the death of Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz, an opponent of women’s participation in global sports events.

It was not immediately clear what prompted the reversal that was announced in a statement by the Saudi embassy in London. A Saudi women equestrian is expected to be the conservative kingdom’s only female athlete likely to qualify for next month’s London Olympics. The kingdom does not encourage women’s sports, offer girls physical education in public schools or include women in its national sports plan.

The embassy statement followed months of sea-saw pronouncements on whether women would be allowed to compete in London, topped in April by a statement by Prince Nayef categorically ruling out. Prince Nayef, largely viewed as a conservative hardliner with close ties to Saudi Arabia’s religious leadership was succeeded as crown prince by Prince Salman bin Abdul Aziz who is believed to be more liberal.

"The kingdom of Saudi Arabia is looking forward to full participation" in the Olympic Games. "The Saudi Olympic Committee will oversee participation of female competitors who qualify," the Saudi embassy in London said.

If indeed implemented it would mark the first time that Saudi women are allowed to officially participate in an international sports tournament and would mean that the kingdom no longer is the only country in the world that refuses to allow women to compete on a global scale.

The embassy statement came at a time that Saudi women have been campaigning for greater rights, focusing on demands to lift a ban on women driving. Proponents of women’s driving submitted earlier this month a petition to King Abdullah with some 600 signatures.

Women driving however has so far been a bridge too far for the king. Scores of women who defied the ban in the past year have been arrested and forced to sign pledges that they would not drive again.  

Manal al-Sharif was detained in May of last year for nine days after she videotaped herself flouting the ban on women driving by getting behind a steering wheel and driving. She was released only after signing a statement promising that she would stop agitating for women's rights.

Prince Nayef dashed hopes that Saudi women would be allowed to participate in the Olympics a month after initially endorsed it by declaring in April that “female sports activity has not existed (in the kingdom) and there is no move thereto in this regard. At present, we are not embracing any female Saudi participation in the Olympics or other international championships.”

The International Olympic Committee which has been negotiating with Saudi Arabia about a lifting of the ban rejected at the time Saudi suggestions that Saudi women living abroad be allowed to compete under the Olympic flag rather than as part of the official Saudi delegation.

International human rights group Human Rights Watch accused Saudi Arabia in February of kowtowing to assertions by the country's powerful conservative Muslim clerics that female sports constitute "steps of the devil" that will encourage immorality and reduce women's chances of meeting the requirements for marriage.

The group’s charges contained in a report entitled “’Steps of the Devil’ came on the heels of the kingdom backtracking on a plan to build its first stadium especially designed to allow women who are currently barred from attending soccer matches because of the kingdom’s strict public gender segregation to watch games. The planned stadium was supposed to open in 2014.

The report urged the IOC to require Saudi Arabia to legalize women's sports as a condition for its participation in Olympic games.

The embassy statement takes on broader significance coming at a time that King Abdullah is seeking to counter attempts by conservative clerics to thwart his minimal reforms and circumvent post-9/11 restrictions on charitable donating, designed to prevent funds from flowing to militant Islamists.

It’s a delicate balancing act for more reform-minded members of the royal family like King Abdullah who rely on the clergy to support the kingdom’s efforts to contain the Middle East and North Africa’s wave of anti-government protests that have already toppled the autocratic leaders of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen and brought Syria to the brink of civil war. Some clerics have asserted that the protests stem from the mingling of the sexes in sports.

“In the past it was only men, now it is almost half half (in stadiums). Allah knows what happens afterwards. Either way it is bad. Either people go out, they are sensing and partying and drinking and all that, so that’s negative. And if they don’t, they go out and they demonstrate and they’re angry and they destroy property and they destroy cars and they destroy people’s business. Either way its haram (forbidden), things have to be done in moderation,” said A Saudi-backed imam Abu Abdellah of the As-Sunnah mosque in Kissimee, Florida. His statement was in line with a series of pronouncements by senior religious leaders in the kingdom itself.

Show-jumper Dalma Rushdi Malhas is likely to be Saudi Arabia’s only female representative in London if the kingdom adheres to the new policy announced by its London. Ms. Malhas in 2010 became the first Saudi woman to compete in the Youth Olympics, where she won a bronze participating on an individual basis rather than as part of a Saudi team.

"I am determined to give my best to reach their level one day, and prove that all women athletes, all over the world, should be given equal opportunities," 20-year old Ms. Malhas said in February at a conference where breaking with Saudi tradition she spoke with her hair uncovered.

James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, author of the blog, The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer, and a consultant to geopolitical consulting firm Wikistrat.

Soccer meets politics at Doha’s Mohammed Abdul Wahhab Mosque (Play the Game)_

Qatar’s increasing engagement in European soccer and international sport is just

one leg in the small Gulf State’s high-risk attempts to position itself as a global player

‘on the right side of history’. But the accompanying social and political changes also

spark local opposition in a conservative culture, James M. Dorsey writes in his second

analysis on the Gulf State’s growing influence in international sport.

By James M. Dorsey

Play the Game

20 April 2012

Print version

Mohammed Abdul Wahhab Mosque in Doha. Photo: Omar Chatriwala/Flickr

A multi-domed, sand-coloured, architectural marvel, Doha’s newest and biggest

mosque, symbolizes both Qatar’s bold storm into the 21st century and the pitfalls

that that march entails. It’s not the mosque itself that raises eyebrows but its

naming after an 18th century warrior priest, Sheikh Mohammed Abdul Wahhab,

the founder of Islam’s most puritan sect

Ironically, the mosque owes its naming to the debate Qatar’s winning of the right to

 host the 2022 World Cup has sparked. It is a debate that goes to the heart of the

energy-rich Gulf state’s identity and the place its ruler, Emir Hamad bin Khalifa al

Thani, wants to carve out for his tiny city-state. 

The World Cup constitutes a centrepiece of a strategy that seeks to reshape the

identity of the world’s only state outside of Saudi Arabia that adheres to

Wahhabism, one of Islam’s most austere and restrictive interpretations of Islam;

position Qatar as a global player capable of punching above its weight; create

opportunities to leverage its enormous wealth in a bid to reduce its reliance on

the export of one commodity; and enhance its security by establishing mutually

beneficial relations with friend and foe and ensuring that it is at the cutting edge

of history.

The sports leg of Qatar’s broader, high-risk geo-political, economic and media

strategy – involving the creation of a world class airline, Qatar Airways; Al

Jazeera as a cutting edge global broadcaster; a far more liberal interpretation of

Wahhabism than that of Saudi Arabia and support for many of the popular uprisings

sweeping the Middle East and North Africa – is emerging as a driver of imminent

restructuring of the region’s soccer landscape as well as of social change. 

To achieve his goal, Emir Hamad has embarked on a buying spree of European soccer

assets such as Paris Saint Germain and top league European broadcast rights as well

as big ticket sponsorship agreements with the likes of FC Barcelona and the Tour de

France, multiple bids for the hosting of international sports tournaments and the

construction of world class infrastructure at a cost of tens of billions of dollar.

The strategy, which has exposed Qatar to an unprecedented degree of international

scrutiny, has already succeeded in putting Qatar with a population of some 1.7 million

of which some two thirds are expatriates on the global map. Doha’s massive

international airport is even before its completion an international hub connecting the

world’s seven continents. Al Jazeera competes with the BBC as the world’s foremost

global broadcaster while Qatari businessmen are beginning to reap benefits in terms of

business opportunities from their country’s investment in sports. Doha is a sought after

venue for disputing parties such as the United States and the Taliban, bitterly divided

Palestinian factions and warring parties in Sudan, to find a way to bridge their differences. 

It is a strategy that envisions cost outstripping material benefit for years to come with

some individual components producing tangible results quicker than others. In many ways

however, the intangibles – regional and political change, global positioning and the

benefits of being on the right side of history – are as if not more important than a

bookkeeper’s calculation of outlays and revenues.

Sparking opposition in the emir’s backyard

Yet, it is those intangibles that are sparking opposition in Emir Hamad’s own backyard to

the social and economic changes necessary to transform Qatar into a global sports hub and the political and diplomatic path on which the Gulf state has embarked that is likely to

produce a region very different from the one conservative Wahhabis envision. These

intangibles challenge a religious and cultural environment that discourages women’s

involvement in sports, often sees Western-style entertainment and fun as irreligious,

opposes the kind of political change sweeping the Middle East and North Africa and

favours government and society’s uncompromising adherence to Islamic law. 

In the latest spat, conservative Qataris, including members of the royal family, quietly

backed by Saudi Arabia have challenged the emir’s authority to allow the sale of alcohol

and pork to non-Muslims. The conservative opposition has already prompted the ban

of alcohol on a man-made island largely frequented by expatriates, a decision to make

Arabic rather than English the language of instruction in education and a boycott of

Qatar Airways. So far both sides have scored points. Sports has been exempted from the

imposition of Arabic as the language of  instruction while the naming of the mosque

after Sheikh Mohammed throws a bone to the conservatives albeit one that is unlikely

to satisfy them.

Asian Cup in 2010 in Qatar. Photo: lefty1007/Flickr 

Beyond forging a national identity, sports serves also as an effort to pre-empt the

kind of youth-led rebellion that has been rocking much of the region for the past

16 months. “Our goal is to create a dialogue that resonates with and talks to the

youth. This is an opportunity to inspire and engage young people…. Sports are at

the heart of Qatar’s development… Sports like education and arts are part of our

national identity,” Noora Al Mannai, CEO of Qatar’s bid to win the right to host the

2020 Olympic Games, told a recent brainstorm in Qatar designed to define the role

of government, NGOs and business in sports. She described “empowering young

people” as one reason for the bid alongside Qatar’s efforts to mediate conflicts and

reduce regional obesity and diabetes levels.  

Sport as a trigger for social change

Nonetheless, sports are likely to spark a social revolution of sorts as long as the emir

is able to keep the conservatives in check. For one, it is forcing Qatar to become the

first wealthy Gulf state dependent on expatriate labour to significantly improve

working conditions and the legal environment of expatriate workers in line with

international standards. It is however not clear yet whether that will also mean

legalizing the existence of trade unions. 

With international trade unions threatening a global campaign under the slogan

'No World Cup in Qatar without labour rights,' Qatar has further vowed to ensure

that contractors involved in preparations for the 2022 World Cup will adhere to

international labour laws.

Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee Secretary General Hassan Al Thawadi conceded

early this year that "major sporting events shed a spotlight on conditions in

countries. There are labour issues here in the country, but Qatar is committed to

reform. We will require that contractors impose a clause to ensure that

international labour standards are met. Sport and football in particular, is a very

powerful force. Certainly we can use it for the benefit of the region."

Qatar and other oil-rich Gulf states have long been targeted by labour organizations

for their treatment of particularly unskilled and low-skilled workers. Qatar like the

UAE and others in the Gulf operates a sponsorship program under which all foreign

workers have to have a local sponsor who can make seeking alternative employment

or another sponsor difficult and who often retains the worker’s passport on

employment. Trade unionists argue that the lack of a minimum wage further

enhances exploitation of labour.

The issue of workers’ rights touches a raw nerve in countries like Qatar and the UAE

where the local population constitutes a minority. Gulf states are concerned that

improving labour conditions would not only have economic consequences but also

give foreigners a greater stake in a society which ensures they are forced to leave the

country once their contract has ended.

Qatar’s employment of sports to project itself internationally coupled with pressure

from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has also prompted Qatar to field

women’s athletes for the first time in its history at this year’s London Olympics. Qatar

alongside Saudi Arabia, which is still struggling with how to respond to the IOC, and

Brunei, is the only country never to have been represented by women at an

international tournament. To be fair, women in Qatar, in contrast to their sisters in

Saudi Arabia, are by and large subject to far less restrictions.

Increasing professionalization and commercialization in the region

Finally, in a part of the world where sports and particularly soccer are often a

battlefield for political, ethnic, religious and gender rights, Qatar’s successful bid for

the 2022 World Cup has sparked a growing push towards professionalization,

commercialization and the creation of a proper football industry as a key to

unlocking economic opportunity. 

For many in the region, last year’s Asia Cup final in Doha, in which half of the

competing teams hailed from the Middle East with not one reaching the semi-finals,

constituted a wake-up call. It is an experience, Middle Eastern leaders and soccer

officials do not want repeated at the Qatar World Cup.

"Something is moving," says Santino Saguto, an Italian soccer management

consultant based in Dubai. "Qatar 2022 has prompted the region to discuss ways to

create value. The leagues, the football associations and the media are starting to buy

into the concept. That's how it started in Europe."

The UAE took a first step a few years ago when for the first time it marketed the rights

to broadcast its league matches – a key step in generating revenue and creating value.

The UAE example is reportedly being discussed by Saudi Arabia, the region's most

important league beyond Egypt.

That is not to say that the UAE's blazing of the trail is not without its birth pangs.

Commercial broadcasters charge that state-owned networks distort competition by

paying exorbitant amounts for the exclusive right to broadcast major football events.

They point to Al Jazeera's clinching of the right to broadcast the 2018 and 2022 Fifa

World Cups for an undisclosed amount believed to be in excess of US$3 billion.

Abu Dhabi Media Company, owned by the royal family, was moreover awarded the

exclusive rights to air the English Premier League in the UAE.

---

James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International

Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and the author of the blog, 

The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer. 

Conservative Saudi crown prince endorses female participation in Olympics

Saudi Crown Prince Nayef: a liberal in disguise?

By James M. Dorsey

Saudi Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud has approved plans for the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom to send female athletes to the Olympics for the first time at the London Games in a move that counters fears that he would be a less progressive ruler than ailing King Abdullah, according to Saudi-owned Al Hayat newspaper.

In doing so, Prince Nayef, the kingdom’s long-serving interior minister who is widely viewed as a conservative even by Saudi standards and is closer than the king to the country’s powerful, austere Wahhabi clergy, is bowing to pressure from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that threatened to bar Saudi Arabia from the London games if it failed to field female athletes.

The decision is likely to be welcomed by liberal Saudis who worry that once he succeeds 

King Abdullah he will prove to be more susceptible to demands of the clergy who adhere to the teachings of the 18^th century puritan warrior-priester, Mohammed Abdul Wahhab to reverse the process of gradual political, economic and social reforms initiated by King Abdullah. In an illustration’s of the clergy’s conservatism, Saudi Arabia's Grand Mufti Abd al-Aziz bin Abdullah recently called for the destruction of all churches in the Arabian Peninsula.

The decision by Prince Nayef is likely part of a concerted government effort to fend off a possible popular uprising in the kingdom similar to those sweeping large parts of the Middle East and North Africa by catering to youth sentiments and growing female demand for sporting opportunities.

Prince Nayef earned a reputation as a hardliner most recently for his crackdown on Al Qaeda militants in the kingdom. By the same token, he oversaw a largely successful rehabilitation program that guided the return to society of former Al Qaeda operatives.

Al Hayat said that Prince Nayef’s approval was conditioned on women competing in sports that "meet the standards of women's decency and don't contradict Islamic laws." It was not immediately clear which sports the crown prince had in mind.

Al Hayat reported Prince Nayef’s decision a day after the IOC reported that progress had been made in negotiations with Saudi Olympic officials on sending female athletes and officials to the games.

Saudi Arabia alongside Qatar and Brunei has never included women in its Olympic teams. IOC officials believe that Qatar and Brunei will also be fielding women athletes in London for the first time.

“The IOC is confident that Saudi Arabia is working to include women athletes and officials at the Olympic Games in London in accordance with the international federations' rules," the IOC said.

Earlier, IOC President Jacques Rogge said in an interview with The Associated Press that he was "optimistic" that Saudi Arabia would send women to London. "It depends on the possibilities of qualifications, standards of different athletes. We're still discussing the various options," Mr. Rogge said.

He said a decision would be finalized within a month to six weeks, but "we are optimistic that this is going to happen."

The apparent IOC success in nudging Saudi Arabia into complying with the committee’s charter contrasts starkly with world soccer body FIFA’s failure to hold the kingdom to its obligation. Saudi Arabia fields a men’s soccer team but restricts if not bans women’s soccer.

FIFA’s failure to pressure Saudi Arabia also contrasts with its recent effort to ensure that observant Muslim women can play professional soccer by lifting its ban on women wearing the hijab in favour of a headdress that fulfils the cultural needs of Muslim players and meets safety and security standards.

International human rights group Human Rights Watch last month accused Saudi Arabia of kowtowing to assertions by the country's powerful conservative Muslim clerics that female sports constitute "steps of the devil" that will encourage immorality and reduce women's chances of meeting the requirements for marriage.

The Human Rights Watch charges contained in a report entitled “’Steps of the Devil’ came on the heels of the kingdom backtracking on a plan to build its first stadium especially designed to allow women who are currently barred from attending soccer matches because of the kingdom’s strict public gender segregation to watch games. The planned stadium was supposed to open in 2014.

The report urged the International Olympic Committee to require Saudi Arabia to legalize women's sports as a condition for its participation in Olympic games.

Saudi women despite official discouragement have in recent years increasingly been pushing the envelope at times with the support of more liberal members of the ruling Al Saud family. The kingdom's toothless Shura or Advisory Council has issued regulations for women's sports clubs, but conservative religious forces often have the final say in whether they are implemented or not.

In a sign that efforts to allow and encourage women's sports are at best haphazard and supported only by more liberal elements in the government, the kingdom last year hired a consultant to develop its first national sports plan - for men only. There is no legal ban in on women’s sports in Saudi Arabia where the barriers for women are rooted in tradition and the kingdom’s puritan interpretation of Islamic law.

The pushing of the envelope comes as women are increasingly challenging other aspects of the kingdom's gender apartheid against the backdrop of simmering discontent in Saudi society over a host of issues.

Manal al-Sharif was detained in May of last year for nine days after she videotaped herself flouting the ban on women driving by getting behind a steering wheel and driving. She was released only after signing a statement promising that she would stop agitating for women's rights.

A group of women launched earlier this year a legal challenge to the ban asserting that it had no base in Islamic law.

Opposition to women's sports is reinforced by the fact that physical education classes are banned in state-run Saudi girl’s schools. Public sports facilities are exclusively for men and sports associations offer competitions and support for athletes in international competitions only to men.

The issue of women's sport has at time sparked sharp debate with conservative clerics condemning it as corrupting and satanic and charging that it spreads decadence. 

Conservative clerics have warned that running and jumping can damage a woman's hymen and ruin her chances of getting married.

One group of religious scholars argued that swimming, soccer and basketball were too likely to reveal “private parts,” which includes large areas of the body. Another religious scholar said it could lead to “mingling with men.”

To be fair, less conservative clerics have come out in favour of women's sports as well as less restrictions on women. In addition, the newly appointed head of the kingdom's religious vigilantes is reported to favour relaxation of the ban on the mixing of the sexes.

In defiance of the obstacles to their right to engage in sports, women have in recent years quietly been establishing soccer and other sports teams using extensions of hospitals and health clubs as their base.

Prince Nayef’s decision has revived hope that 18-year old equestrienne Dalma Rushdi Malhas who won a bronze medal in the 2010 Singapore Youth Olympics in which she participated at her own accord would be among the first Saudi women athletes to compete at an Olympic games. Expectations that she would be competing in London were dashed recently when the Saudis qualified an all-men team qualified for London’s jumping competition.

James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and the author of the blog, The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer.

Saudi Arabia to send token woman to Olympics to evade sanctions

Saudi Arabia's token female athlete: Dalma Rushdi Malhas (Source: sport.virgilio.it)

By James M. Dorsey

Saudi Arabia in a bid to avoid being barred from the 2012 London Olympics has agreed to send a token female equestrian to the tournament to represent the conservative kingdom that effectively discourages women's sports.

The decision followed a warning last year by Anita DeFrantz, the chair of the International Olympic Committee's Women and Sports Commission, that Saudi Arabia alongside Qatar and Brunei could be barred if they did not send for the first time at least one female athlete to the London Olympics.

An earlier agreement by Qatar, the only other country whose indigenous population are largely Wahhabis, adherents of a puritan interpretation of Islam predominant in Saudi Arabia, to field a women's team in London increased the pressure on the kingdom to follow suit.

The decision however is likely to prove less controversial  in Qatar than Saudi Arabia. Qatar has far fewer of Saudi Arabia's sharper edges such as a ban on women's driving, strict gender segregation and a culture that enshrines male dominance.

.

Saudi Arabia's most likely female athlete is 18-year old equestrienne Dalma Rushdi Malhas who won a bronze medal in the 2010 Singapore Youth Olympics. At the time, Ms. Malhas was not officially delegated to compete in Singapore on behalf of the kingdom.

“I didn’t know whether I was allowed but when I got invited of course I didn’t think twice and went at my own expense, I didn’t care much about me being there as a representative of Saudi Arabia, because anyone could probably do that. But getting a medal was the key, and that’s not easy for anyone, and I wanted that — and only that gives recognition to my country,” she told the Arab News.

Despite official discouragement women have increasingly been pushing the envelope at times with the support of more liberal members of the ruling Al Saud family, The kingdom's toothless Shura or Advisory Council has issued regulations for women's sports clubs, but conservative religious forces often have the final say.

Nonetheless the mandate granted to a Spanish consultancy earlier this year to develop the kingdom's first national sports plan is exclusively for men's sports.

The pushing of the envelope comes as women are proving to be the most visible in challenging the kingdom's gender apartheid against the backdrop of simmering discontent. Manal al-Sharif was detained in May for nine days after she videotaped herself flouting the rules by getting behind a steering wheel and driving. She was released only after signing a statement promising a that she would stop agitating for women's rights.

Discrepancy about women's sports is reinforced by the fact that physical education classes are banned in state-run Saudi girl’s schools  Women's games and marathons are often cancelled when more conservative members of the clergy gets wind of them.

The issue of women's sport has at time sparked sharp debate with clerics condemning it as corrupting and satanic and charging that it spreads decadence. Clerics warned that running and jumping can damage a woman's hymen and ruin her chances of getting married. In defiance, women have quietly been establishing soccer and other sports teams using extensions of hospitals and health clubs as their base.

Fielding a female equestrian at the London Olympics may take Saudi Arabia off the IOC's hook, but changes little on the ground in the kingdom itself. That remains an uphill battle particularly with an ageing and ailing top leadership that this year has significantly increased the religious establishment's funding as part of its bid to shield Saudi Arabia from the wave of anti-government protests sweeping the region.

James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and the author of the blog, The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer.