The National : Police and mobs clash on streets

Hamida Ghafour, Foreign Correspondent

Last Updated: April 21. 2008 3:45PM UAE / April 21. 2008 11:45AM GMT

MANAMA // Behind the mosque in Karzakkan town, six young men stood in the shadows looking anxiously over their shoulders. A demonstration planned for the afternoon was cancelled when police officers armed with tear gas canisters and rubber bullet arrived. The youth were now looking somewhere to hide while the authorities searched the town for them.

“If they catch us, they will beat us,” said Habib Mohammed Habib, 20. “They already have my brother.”

Hamida Ghafour, Foreign Correspondent

Last Updated: April 21. 2008 3:45PM UAE / April 21. 2008 11:45AM GMT

MANAMA // Behind the mosque in Karzakkan town, six young men stood in the shadows looking anxiously over their shoulders. A demonstration planned for the afternoon was cancelled when police officers armed with tear gas canisters and rubber bullet arrived. The youth were now looking somewhere to hide while the authorities searched the town for them.

“If they catch us, they will beat us,” said Habib Mohammed Habib, 20. “They already have my brother.”

The men were wanted in connection with the death of a Pakistani-born police officer on April 9 during violent clashes between youth and the police. The police say their comrade was ambushed and his car set on fire.

According to Hussein Ali, 26, the young people were not involved. “But we cannot even go and talk to the police,” Mr Ali said.

Stark confrontations between the kingdom’s restive youth and the police are becoming more frequent in Bahrain. In the past month, 47 people have been arrested, according to Nabeel Rajab, a local human rights activist.

Every night, tyres are set on fire to block the streets and taunt police. The acrid black smoke mars the evening skies as riot police race to catch the suspects who usually vanish into the alleyways in the tatty towns that circle the capital.

“Thursday and Friday nights are called fireworks night,” said Mr Rajab, who lives on the western tip of the island. “Police throw tear gas and young guys throw Molotov cocktails. The relationship between the young people and police is the worst I’ve seen.”

Political dissidents, including Mr Rajab, whose organisation the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights was shut down by the government, say masked police come at night to harass and detain people.

Mohammed bin Mohammed bin Daina, a police spokesman, said it was untrue that gunmen had been recruited to intimidate residents in the villages.

“There are civilian police and they do patrolling,” he said. “We have recruited [foreigners] as part of our force in the normal way.”

To curb the violence, parliament agreed recently to pass formal legislation to ban Molotov cocktails and monitor websites that incite hatred.

Activists from across the political spectrum said the root of the problem is socio-economic, although it is being framed in a sectarian manner.

Bahrain is the only country in the Gulf where Shia Muslims outnumber Sunnis and they are believed to account for as much as two-thirds of the population. For years, they have complained about discrimination in jobs, housing and education. The unemployment rate is between 16 per cent and 18 per cent. The anger reached a fever pitch in the mid-1990s with a series of bomb attacks and the deaths of 40 people.

As part of a series of political reforms, the king called a parliamentary election in 2006 and al Wefaq, the main Shiite opposition, made strong gains with 18 seats, raising hopes that Shiites would acquire political power. But the pro-monarchy parties and a shura, or council, appointed by the king hold the other 62 seats.

But political reform had faltered in part because the elected represen-tatives cannot pass legislation, said Munira Fakhro, a former professor at Bahrain University.

“All they do is squabble about minor issues like the hijab and call each other names,” she said.

Mrs Fakhro said that in 2001 when reforms began, Bahrainis were hopeful for the future.

“I remember when the king went to Sitra town, people carried his car … They thought they would be given what they want. They didn’t care if the king is Sunni or Shiite.”

Abduljalil al Singace, the director of al Haq, a hardline political movement that has refused to take part in the elections on the basis that they are a “sham process”, said the young people had grown more violent because they had no leaders representing their aspirations.

“The most dangerous thing is when they think they have nothing to lose … We have a crisis here. It is being treated by security means. It needs to be solved politically.”

The Shiite opposition claims the government is trying to marginalise them.

A government minister recently admitted that the population of the island had jumped to more than one million over the past couple of years from 700,000. Al Wefaq has tried without success for a year to summon the minister of state for cabinet affairs for questioning over the sudden increase in population. They are concerned that foreigners are being given Bahraini passports in a bid to tip the sectarian balance in favour of Sunnis, as outlined in a 240-page report by Salah al Bandar, a former Sunni government adviser who is in exile in England.

As parliament continues to squabble, tensions are rising on the streets.

The touch paper for the current cycle of unrest was lit on Dec 17 when Ali Jassim, 30, was killed at a demonstration in Sanabis town. During the three-day mourning period, protests raged as Mr Jassim’s supporters demanded retribution.

“My brother went to a rally about human rights in different places,” Hassan Jassim, 29, said of his brother at his house in Jidhafs town, where most the shops carry posters of Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary general.

“In the 1990s, a lot of people died and went to jail, we cannot forget. We got through the gates of a dictatorship but not a democracy. We want to change the constitution. We want jobs. We want equal opportunities in the ministries.”

After the December protests, 40 people were arrested. Fifteen are in custody on several charges including stealing guns from a police car. Their trial has been delayed until May 11 to allow the defence to examine medical reports on detainees’ claims that they have been tortured in prison.

Nader Ali, who was among the arrested activists, said the government was cracking down on people who spoke out about deteriorating living conditions.

“I’m on a committee for unemployed and underpaid people. In 2005, we had 30,000 unemployed and another 35,000 to 40,000 underpaid, so salary is less than 200 [Bahrain dinars] (Dh1,953) a month. We formed this [committee] because the government is getting workers from abroad and giving them salaries and housing. But why aren’t they giving us jobs?”

Mohammed al Maskati, 21, president of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, which has documented the arrests, said: “They want better jobs and houses. They said, ‘OK you won’t give us political rights so give us economic rights’. In the Emirates, the government gives youth their economic rights.”

Most observers said the root of the problem was increasing cost of living, inflation and lack of decent housing.

In many of the villages, whether Sunni or Shiite, the houses have tin roofs, cracked or collapsed walls. Salt water runs from the tap. Families of up to 17 live in two or three rooms. There are 40,000 people on a waiting list for housing.

Abdullah Hussein, who shares a house with his brother-in-law’s family in Diraz village, said: “I’ll grow old and die in this house and my son will grow up here and he will still live in one room with his family. Only on TV you see Bahrain is good. At the roundabout a week ago kids were fighting with the police. But we don’t want problems, we just want to live.”

Ibrahim, his brother-in-law, said: “Every Gulf state gives its people houses. We found oil in 1932. And you see our houses?”

They said they voted for al Wefaq in 2006, but the party had done nothing for them.

But Jawad Fairooz, the deputy leader of al Wefaq, said the government was building homes as fast as it could to reduce the waiting list to 15,000 by 2010.

Hassan Fakhro, the minister of industry and commerce, said reform was on the right track and new laws were being passed regularly.

“The world wasn’t made in a day,” he said. “People’s expectations are too high. Inflation is a problem, but if our currency is pegged to the dollar what can we do?”

He said that the government had started a labour fund to train Bahrainis.

“Some of the extreme elements would like to change the constitution and have a totally elected parliament. So they think by burning tyres they are protesting, but this is terror.”

As for the young people in Karzakkan town, parliament and politics are a distant concern.

Hussein Ali, who is on the police wanted list, said they would take their inspiration from young people in France’s suburbs because they had no politicians to whom to turn.

“We will continue to burn,” he said.