Saudi Leadership
Although the Saudi king is an absolute monarch in the sense that there are no formal, institutionalized checks on his authority, in practice his ability to rule effectively depends on his astuteness in creating and maintaining consensus within his very large, extended family. The king is the patriarch of the Al Saud, which, including all its collateral branches, numbered about 20,000 people. These persons traced their patrilineal descent to Muhammad ibn Saud, the eighteenth-century founder of the dynasty.
As one of world's last absolute monarchs, the Saudi Arabian king exercises very broad powers. He is both head of state and head of government. Ultimate authority in virtually every aspect of government rests with the king. All legislation is enacted either by royal decree or by ministerial decree, which has to be sanctioned by the king. In his capacity as prime minister, the king appoints all cabinet ministers, other senior government officials, and the governors of the provinces. In his capacity as commander in chief of the armed forces, the king appoints all military officers above the rank of lieutenant colonel. He also appoints all Saudi Arabia's ambassadors and other foreign envoys. All foreign diplomats in the country are accredited to the king. In addition, the king acts as the final court of appeal and had the power of pardon.
The legitimacy of the king's rule is based on the twin pillars of religion and the dynastic history of the Al Saud. The family's most important early ancestor, Muhammad ibn Saud (1710- 65), had been a relatively minor local ruler in Najd before establishing a political and family alliance with the puritanical Muslim preacher and reformer Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab (1703-87) in 1744. Muhammad ibn Saud and his descendants -- the Al Saud -- ardently supported the preacher and his descendants -- the Al ash Shaykh -- and were determined to introduce a purified Islam, which opponents called Wahhabism, throughout Arabia. Religious fervor facilitated the conquest of Najd and at the height of their power in the early nineteenth century, the Al Saud had extended their control over most of the Arabian Peninsula. Subsequent conflict with the Ottoman Empire and dynastic rivalries both diminished and enhanced the political fortunes of the Al Saud throughout the nineteenth century. Nevertheless, the Saudi alliance with the Al ash Shaykh endured. Through the political and military genius of King Abdul Aziz (Ibn Saud), the tribes of most of the Arabian Peninsula were eventually welded together to form a single nation within a Kingdom founded upon Islam.
The modern history of Arabia is often broken into three periods that follow the fortunes of the Al Saud. The first begins with the alliance between Muhammad ibn Saud and Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab and ends with the capture of Abd Allah. The second period extends from this point to the rise of the second Abd al Aziz ibn Saud, the founder of the modern state; the third consists of the establishment and present history of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
At Madina on October 27, 1986 (or 24 Safar 1407 AH in the Islamic calendar), King Fahd expressed the wish, in an official letter to Crown Prince Abdallah, that henceforth he be addressed only as ‘Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques,’ and no longer as ‘Your Majesty’ or any other secular title.
The Council of Ministers was established by King Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al-Saud in 1953. It consists of the King who is the Prime Minister, the Crown Prince who is Deputy Prime Minister, the Second Deputy Prime Minister and Cabinet ministers. Under the bylaws announced by the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud in September 1993, the Council is responsible for drafting and overseeing the implementation of the internal, external, financial, economic, educational and defense policies, and general affairs of the state. The Council meets weekly and is presided over by the King or one of his deputies. On August 2, 1995, King Fahd issued a Royal Decree dissolving the Council of Ministers and announcing the names of Ministers in the new Cabinet under his chairmanship.
Succession
The relatively smooth transitions following the deaths of Faisal and Khalid seemed to have resolved the issue of succession among the sons of Abd al Aziz. In 1992, however, Fahd altered the procedure for designating future kings. In the same royal decree that announced the impending appointment of a majlis, Fahd declared that the king would henceforth name and could remove the crown prince. Furthermore, the crown prince would not automatically succeed on the death of the king, but serve as provisional ruler until he, or a descendant of Abd al Aziz deemed more suitable, was enthroned.
Fahd's 1992 decree on succession established two precedents: a royal prerogative to choose and to withdraw approval for the crown prince; and an acknowledgement that the more than sixty grandsons of Abd al Aziz were legitimate claimants to the throne. The leading figures among these ‘Second Generation’ princes include: Prince Bandar, his brother Khalid, Mohammed (son of Fahd and governor of the Eastern Province), Prince Saud (son of King Faisal and foreign minister), his brother Turki (chief of Foreign Intelligence), Lt. Gen. Sultan (son of Prince Salman), and Mitab (son of Abdullah).
Previously, Saudi kings had not asserted the right to dismiss a designated crown prince. By proclaiming such a right, Fahd revived persistent rumors originating in the 1970s that he and his half brother Abdullah disagreed on many political issues. To forestall speculation that his intent was to remove Abdullah as crown prince and replace him with his full brother Sultan, Fahd reaffirmed Abdullah's position. However, in declaring that successor kings would be chosen from the most suitable of Abd al Aziz's sons and grandsons, Fahd implied that Abdullah or any future crown prince was not necessarily the presumed heir to the throne. The decision to include the grandsons in the selection process and as potential candidates for the throne symbolized the readiness of Fahd and his surviving brothers to pass substantive decision-making responsibilities to a younger generation of the Al Saud. However, this decision also introduced more uncertainty into the succession process. At least a dozen men of this Al Saud younger generation, including sons of Faisal, Fahd, Abdullah, and Sultan, were actively involved in the Saudi government and presumably had a personal interest in the question of succession.
King Fahd's March 1992 edict on succession initiated a contentious struggle for power. Resolved in the fall of 1996, Saudi Arabia endured three years of internecine conflict between Abdullah, the Heir Apparent and commander-in-chief of the Saudi Arabian National Guard (SANG), pitted against Prince Sultan, second deputy prime minister and after Fahd the eldest of the Sudairi Seven. In December 1995 Sultan summoned members of the Ulema to seek their sanction of his claim to the throne and to dismiss Abdullah as Commander in Chief of the National Guard. In the aftermath of the failed coup, Abdullah ordered the National Guard’s well trained Bedouins to engage in highly visible military maneuvers. The prospect of Abdullah’s national guard engaging the better equipped regular Saudi armed forces was intolerable. On 01 January 1996, Fahd ended the crisis by announcing that because of ill health he was temporarily transferring the powers of state to Abdullah. Since 1997, Crown Prince Abdullah has taken on much of the day-to-day responsibilities of running the government.
The United States was said by some to be hostile towards Prince Abdallah. But the US could not avoid his being crowned successor to King Fahd. Instead, the US tried to reinforce the power of the "third generation" princes educated in the United States. These included Prince Muhammad, King Fahd's favorite son and governor of the East region, who was said to be strongly opposed to fundamentalism.
Others frequently mentioned were Prince Salman, a son of Abdelaziz who had been governor of Riyadh since 1962; Prince Saud bin Faisal, a grandson of Abdelaziz and son of the late King Faisal who has been foreign minister since 1975; and his brother, Prince Turki bin Faisal, who was head of the Department of General Intelligence from 1977 through 2001, later becoming abmassador to the United States in July 2005.
Others seen by some as viable candidates in were two other grandsons of Abdelaziz: Prince Khalid bin Faisal, governor of Asir since 1977, and Prince Bandar bin Sultan, son of Prince Sultan (Defense Minister and a Sudeiri) and ambassador to the United States since 1983.
