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Oh,Brother, can you spare me a dinar?
The desert kingdom has seen street beggars proliferate for the first time in its existence. But the Saudis are dealing with the problem in typical fashion -- wholesale arrests.Yup, that's typical. In raids in Riyadh, Jeddah and other major towns Saudi police have so far put 13,580 beggars behind bars. Doesn't the Koran say something about feeding the needy? Also typically, Social Affairs Minister Awadh al Radadi said Monday 11,848 of the detained beggars were foreigners, quite a few of them migrant workers who are now without jobs. Al Radadi observed, "The beggars use different methods to draw the attention and sympathy of philanthropists. They often display medical bills and house rent agreements and tell sob stories of their sufferings to win sympathy." Street urchins have also embraced high-tech and use cell phones to warn one another when police are in the vicinity. The per capita income in Saudi Arabia dropped from around $20,000 to $10,300 in the last 25 years. I wonder where all that oil money is going? Posted by: Steve 2002-11-19 |
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