(Bloomberg Opinion) -- It has been two days since the highest profile arrests in Saudi Arabia’s history, but there has been no official explanation yet. Bloomberg News has learned that members of the Allegiance Council, a group that votes on matters of succession, have been told that Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz (the last surviving full brother of King Salman bin Abdulaziz) and Prince Mohammed bin Nayef (a former heir apparent to the Saudi throne with strong ties to the U.S. security establishment) had been plotting a coup.
That would be the most powerful direct challenge ever to a Saudi ruler — of a magnitude greater than the last, in 1969, when a plan by some air force officers to overthrow the monarchy never got off the ground. So you’d expect either King Salman or Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to address their countrymen, and the international community, with some words of reassurance. This hasn’t happened.
As of writing, some of the other powerful figures arrested have been released. But the two most prominent princes remain in custody.
The rumor mills of Riyadh have ground through every possible reason for the high drama of the weekend. Had MBS, as the current crown prince is known, simply grown fed up of the others because they’d been carping about him at family get togethers? Was he signaling to the rest of the House of Saud that he would brook no dissent? Could he simply be getting rid of alternate power centers in preparation for his own elevation to the throne? Or were the others indeed actively plotting to block his accession?
There was even some speculation that the roundup was precipitated by King Salman, 84, taking to his death bed. The royal court was compelled to release photographs and video showing the monarch in good health.
The absence of clarity around events of grave national and global importance should alarm foreign governments and investors as much as Saudis — not least after Riyadh launched an oil price war, forcing Brent crude to tumble to $31 a barrel on Monday morning and sparking panic in global markets. By then, a new rumor was afloat: the arrests were meant to forestall any whingeing about oil prices and their impact on the Saudi economy.
Transparency has never been MBS’s strong suit, and his international standing has been damaged by a series of impulsive and ill-considered decisions. The crown prince’s ruthlessness has tended to overshadow his credentials as a reformer; if the weekend’s arrests remain unexplained, that perception will only deepen.
It won’t be easy to persuade the world that a coup was in the offing. After all, MBS controls all of the kingdom’s key security institutions: the military, the intelligence services and the national guard. He has long since purged the government of royals and officials who might be in any position to challenge him. Just months after being named heir, he ordered the detention of scores of princes and businessmen. Many were released only after agreeing to sign over large portions of their assets — land, cash and stakes in companies — to the government.
Since then, the crown prince has allowed little room for dissent, whether in royal circles or among the wider populace. Human- and women’s-rights activists have been summarily jailed, and critics abroad have faced intimidation. There’s also the chilling effect of the murder of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi: A United Nations investigator has said MBS bears at least some responsibility, and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency believes that he ordered it.
The two leading princes arrested on Friday appeared to have been in no position to dislodge MBS. Mohammed bin Nayef, MBS’s predecessor as crown prince, had once controlled many levers of the state, but he’s been confined mostly to his palace for the past three years. Prince Ahmed, the king’s brother, only returned to the kingdom last year after a long spell in exile in London. He wields no real power.
Given their reduced circumstances, these men would have required a sizeable cohort of co-conspirators to attempt an overthrow of King Salman and his heir. It’s conceivable that the arrests of the weekend were a precursor to a wider crackdown. Transparency may not be his modus operandi, but it’s in MBS’s interest — as well as Saudi Arabia’s and the world’s — to make the process open.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Boxell at jboxell@bloomberg.net
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Bobby Ghosh is a columnist and member of the Bloomberg Opinion editorial board. He writes on foreign affairs, with a special focus on the Middle East and the wider Islamic world.
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