All about the Crown Prince of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

George KhanSaudi Arabian King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud has appointed Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud as the new crown prince, the Royal Court said in a statement issued last Friday, signaling an orderly process of future succession in the world's largest oil exporter. "We chose His Royal Highness Prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz as crown prince," said the statement, read on state television and carried on the kingdom's news agency SPA soon after midnight. The selection of 78-year-old Prince Nayef to succeed Prince Sultan as the new crown prince of Saudi Arabia ushers in the beginning of what promises to be a season of big changes at the top of the royal family and cabinet, all set in the midst of the Arab awakening. Newly appointed Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud has been minister of the interior since 1975. In recent years he has already run the kingdom on a day-to-day basis when King Abdullah and Prince Sultan were both absent. King Abdullah's recurrent back problem has caused him to go abroad for medical treatment. Nayef, who was born in Taif, in western Saudi Arabia, in 1934, was appointed governor of Riyadh when he was barely 20 years old, and held briefly before entering the interior ministry. After a stint as deputy, he was elevated to interior minister in 1975, when his brother Fahd left the post to become crown prince. It said Nayef, who is in his late 70's, was appointed after King Abdullah took his choice to a royal family body called the Allegiance Council, set up in 2006 to make the process of succession in the Islamic nation smoother and more orderly. It was the first time the council had been involved in the appointment of a new crown prince, a move that analysts had said would help to regulate an opaque system of succession. Crown Prince Sultan died of colon cancer in New York almost a week ago. He was also the kingdom's defense and aviation minister for nearly five decades. No replacements for these positions have yet been appointed. At stake is the stability of a key U.S. ally, whose ruling al-Saud family wields great influence over Sunni Muslims through its guardianship of Islam's holiest sites in Mecca and Medina. Over the years, the septuagenarian Saudi royal Nayef has earned a reputation as a traditionalist who is opposed to changes in the country's power structure. Last Thursday, he was named the new crown prince. As interior minister since 1975, a post to which he was reappointed in the Royal Court statement, Nayef has developed a reputation as a conservative with close ties to the Saudi religious establishment. Nayef is sometimes portrayed as putting the brakes on the King Abdullah's cautious reforms, which aim to reconcile the kingdom's conservative Islamic traditions with a youthful, increasingly outward looking population in the Middle East's largest economy. Earlier this year Nayef publicly admonished a member of the mainly consultative Shura Council who had called for a review of the ban on women driving. "This means less for Saudi Arabia's external relations than it does internally because a lot of people there, especially women, are apprehensive that Nayef will close back down some of the space that Abdullah has opened up around individual citizens," said Thomas Lippman, a Saudi Arabia specialist at the Middle East Institute in Washington. However, analysts and former diplomats in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, say Crown Prince Nayef might show a different side to his character in his new position. On the way to Saudi Heir: King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz is in poor health. He attended Sultan's funeral in a wheelchair, wearing a medical mask to protect against infection. Just before his brother's death, the family had put out a photo of the king, surrounded by his cabinet, to show he was in charge. Abdallah was seated in a hospital bed with a blanket on him and no hat. Not the image of a robust leader. So Nayef may become king sooner rather than later. That would mean another succession for the crown prince job. Nayef's brother Salman bin Abdul-Aziz al-Saud, the governor of the capital Riyadh, is probably next in line, but his health is in question too. The youngest of the surviving sons of the modern kingdom's founder, is the intelligence chief Prince Muqrin. The powerful post of defense minister must be filled sooner. The odds favour Sultan's eldest son, Khaled, but he is not a certainty. He was commander of the coalition forces that liberated Kuwait in 1991 and his father's deputy at the Ministry of Defense and Aviation. Saud al-Faysal, the foreign minister, is also in ill health and has long sought to retire. His brother Turki bin Faisal al-Saud is the former intelligence chief and ambassador to both the United States and the United Kingdom. Turki is the usual suspect for moving into the post, but that is also uncertain. He has a habit of saying exactly what he thinks, especially about America's total support for Israel, which would be a tad undiplomatic but refreshingly honest. The Kingdom faces unprecedented challenges in the tsunami of the Arab awakening. Old allies like Hosni Mubarak have been swept away; old adversaries like Muammar Qaddafi are also gone. There have been small but significant protests at home. In tiny neighboring Bahrain, the Saudi army has effectively occupied the country to prevent a Shia revolution. In the rest of the Gulf monarchies and in neighbouring Jordan, the Saudis are urging a tough line against change. Traditionalist ruler: Nayef has strong support among Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi clerics. But he is said to have little sympathy for political Islamist groups, like the Muslim Brotherhood, which he views as a threat to the ruling family's grip on power. Although Sultan, who died on New York last Saturday, was nominally in charge of the "Yemen file", both Nayef and his son played a major role in shaping Saudi policy towards its southern neighbour. Earlier this year, they reportedly assumed control over Saudi Arabia's patronage network in Yemen, through which the kingdom distributes payments to favoured tribal elders and politicians. Diplomats in Riyadh say Nayef has described education as the key to Saudi Arabia's future, echoing a line from Abdullah. They said he has said little about political reforms, women's rights or other contentious issues. In the run-up to Saudi Arabia's 2005 municipal elections, it was Nayef who decided that women should not be allowed to vote. Scholars say he may pursue policies that expand his base of support within security services and Islamist groups. An October 2009 diplomatic cable from the US embassy in Riyadh, obtained by WikiLeaks, described Nayef as a "a conservative pragmatist convinced that security and stability are imperative." It went on to describe him as "elusive, ambiguous, pragmatic, unimaginative, shrewd and outspoken." Bangladesh Hope remains high: Kingdom of Saudi Arabia employs almost 2.0 million Bangladeshi's and till date the highest remittance to enrich foreign currency comes from Saudi Arabia. Bangladesh has always been in a good relationship with Saudi Arab. Our sincere congratulations to His Royal Highness Naeyf Bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud for his new appointment. ...................................................................... The article bas been contributed by the writer, on the basis of different write-ups that appeared recently in the Saudi media and also elsewhere. He can be reached at e-mail : bongaconnection@gmail.com