Al-Watan's Latest Shenanigan

This post started as a comment to a post on Lulu Bahrain's blog (an excellent blog by the way). Lulu brings to light Al-Watan's recent monstrosity disguised in the name of prose. To read the horrendous poem click here.

The comment got longer the angrier I got so I turned it into a post. Here goes:
The newspaper (and I'm using the term loosely here) has certainly stooped to new lows. The poem is crass and more of what you see in tabloids than respected newspapers.

Several points that caught my attention:
The poem rightfully asserts that Al Gaoud has received government assistance to win the seat. In fact I heard she was guaranteed the win unopposed if she doesn't support candidates running in neigboring areas.

The poem also implies that Sunni MPs like Ms Al Gaoud represent the Government. What the poet fails to realize is that any MP- regardless of sex, ethnicity, sect or backing- REPRESENTS THE PEOPLE and THEIR INTERESTS (hence the term public servant). The people and the government's interests ALWAYS differ greatly.

The poet again assumes that Sunnis and the government are on the same side and share similar interests. Unfortunately, we are both suffering. Some Sunni villages are as decrepit and run-down as their Shia counterparts and unemployment is rampant among both sects. In fact, with this recent bout of illegal naturalization, the Sunnis come out the bigger losers. Why? Because army and police jobs are given to the newly naturalized rather than the Bahraini Sunnis.

Finally, and this one takes the cake, the poet (if you can call his work a poem) would have us believe that MP Al Saeedi continues to win his seat by earnest hard-work, prayers and blessings. I suppose the blessings would be Allah’s response to the fervent prayers of such a well-deserving man. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have PERSONALLY heard many persons of his area recount how Al Saeedi continues to bribe them and buy their votes. I remember one lady said that he promised to plant a garden infront of her home. Another stated that he promised to help her mum with the rent. I KNOW of the lies he spewed in the mosque about the other candidates and how the group backing him threatened the military and naturalized citizens to vote his way, how they spied on the competition. The sacks of rice and sugar, the school bags and BD 20s given out with a promise of vote in return. Anyone remember the smear campaign against Al Gaoud in the last election? The only solace I can find where he is concerned is that inshaAllah he will BURN in hell for his evil deeds and for using religion to further his political aspirations.

It saddens me that there are some folks who will side with the 'poet', so taken they are with the lies and brian-washed. Where Ms. Al Gaoud should be congratulated for voting her mind rather than towing the line, she is attacked for showing her allegiance to the people and not the government. When will we wake up and see our ugly truth? Until we do our situation and our beloved Bahrain will only deteriorate.

I will end this rather long rant by stating the obvious: we all know whose thoughts, ideas and version of news Al Watan represents, so really could we expect any better?