The government of Kuwait cannot find peace and this week the executive headed by Sheikh al-Sabah has resigned (again). A resolution will be available shortly
The article by Elia Preto Martini for the Center for International Studies (Cesi)
On Tuesday 5 April, the Kuwaiti government led by Premier Sheikh Sabah al-Khaled al-Hamad al-Sabah submitted his resignation to Crown Prince Sheikh Meshal al-Ahmad al-Jaber Al-Sabah thus anticipating the vote of no confidence that should have been held in Parliament this week.
For the third time in the last year and a half, in fact, the government – in all three cases led by Sheikh al-Sabah – has given its resignation, thus certifying the current political crisis in progress which has mainly manifested itself in the continuous clashes between executive and legislative power. The latest attempt to appoint some figures in some ministries who are partly welcome to the opposition seems to have been of little use, thus seeking a more relaxed approach towards them.
The end of the executive was anticipated by at least two significant events. At the beginning of the year, in fact, the Ministers of the Interior and of Defense had resigned, denouncing that the impossibility of implementing the reforms (especially the fiscal ones) was due to the intransigent attitude of the opposition. Last week, however, an interrogation was carried out against Sheikh al-Sabah himself due to a series of alleged corruption and mismanagement of public finances; a question, this one, which acted de facto as a prelude to the imminent government crisis.
This situation certifies the complexity of the moment experienced by Kuwait, a country that has had to face considerable economic difficulties in recent years due to the lowering of oil prices and closures related to the spread of the coronavirus, especially between 2020 and 2021. Both of these factors contributed to raising the national deficit to 16.6% without local policymakers being able to respond effectively. The fact that the widely debated public debt bill was heavily obstructed (and subsequently blocked) did not allow the government to access new debt. The executive was therefore forced to use a series of short-term tools in order to mitigate the adverse effects of the pandemic. However, international investors and rating agencies reacted with some concern. This is the case, for example, of the Fitch agency which downgraded Kuwait’s rating from “AA” to “AA-“.
In light of these events, it is important to note how the Kuwait Parliament has proved to be a body capable of exerting strong opposition on the executive unlike what happens in other Arab Gulf countries where the parliamentary dimension is strongly delegitimized. This is reflected in the multiplicity of instruments in its possession, such as the blocking of the legislative process, the interrogation of the Ministers and the organization of no-confidence votes against the main representatives of the government.
It remains to be understood, however, how this political and economic crisis – in part also linked to internal clashes within the ruling family – can be resolved in the near future, also in light of the recent upheavals brought about by the Ukrainian crisis in the Middle East.
