Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the arrests of dozens of influential figures on Sunday, which included 14 of his cousins from the royal family of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The attempt to fight corruption in the oil-rich nation comes on the heels of the Future Investment Initiative held last month in Riyadh, where the country unveiled its plans for a mega-city called Project NEOM that would be 33 times the land size of New York City.
Notable among the detainees are Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, the late King Abdullah’s favored son, as well as Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, the kingdom’s wealthiest investor. Prince Mutaib was the head of a major security service, but he was removed from his post just hours before the arrests were announced on Saturday night.
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has also ordered that all members of the royal family should remain in the country.
This is the first revolutionary initiative of such proportions in more than eight decades. The arrests now leave Crown Prince Mohammed, who is King Salman’s favored son and chief adviser, in full control over the kingdom’s main security services: the military, the internal security services and the national guard. For the past several decades, these divisions have been headed by various branches of the House of Saud in an attempt to distribute power evenly among the clan.
These arrests are a culmination of other high-profile arrests that have been made over the past several weeks, and is believed to be a bold statement to bend academic, religious and business groups to bend to the Crown Prince’s will. They also give Crown Prince Mohammed a level of dominance that none of the Saudi rulers have been able to achieve over the past several generations.
Saudi Arabia is reshaping itself to prepare for a future that is not dependent on oil. As global sentiment gradually shifts towards alternate fuels and more sustainable energy sources, the Crown Prince’s decisive moves over the past two years since his father laid claim to the throne two years ago are being seen as the many moving parts of a giant machine that will take Saudi Arabia to the next level of economic and social development.
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