Even before muddy water has been cleared and Saudi Arabia's Red Sea port city of Jeddah has started to heal its wounds, voices of dozens of writers and countless readers called for holding the perpetrators of the "Wednesday disaster" accountable and demanded the authorities open the file of financial and administrative corruption and the state of negligence and apathy rampant in some government departments due to the lack of supervision.
What's the cause? Rain? Act of God? Or "Hawamir (big fish)" of human beings?
Some refused to consider that the loss of many lives and properties caused by the heavy downpour in Jeddah on Wednesday morning was just a natural disaster or God's will.
While most writers and readers did not underestimate the role of rainfall and floods in the disaster nor did they not object to "God's fate", the bulk of the accusations was addressed to influential people, or "Hawamir" (a term used in the Gulf since the first economic boom and means big investors who control the stock market).
In a sarcastic article entitled: "Jeddah of the Sheikh and official", Abdullah Monawar Jumaili asks his imaginary Sheikh: "who is responsible for the lost lives, washed away belongings and wasted public money? Is it the Department of Meteorology that failed to warn citizens about the potential disaster? Is it the civil defence that does not have the necessary number of rescuers, means and capabilities? Is it the official secretariat and municipalities which allowed the establishment of neighbourhoods by the valleys and low lands and wasted billions of riyals without solving the problems of water drainage for years?"
The Sheikh answers: "Aren't you a believer? It is fate and destiny." The writer replies: "Poor dear fate. We always bring you forward as an excuse for the official to justify his administrative limitations and the absence of his national conscience! We do not want lessons in fate as we have already drunk these fundamental truths with our mothers' milk! What we want is holding the official accountable and questioning him!"
Crime with premeditation
Although some officials, such as the minister of transport, stressed that Mermaid 9name given to Jeddah) sank because some of the affected neighborhoods were established across stream valleys, and refused to blame anybody.
However, there was agreement among the vast majority of writers and readers about probing the file of the municipality's projects, especially when these catastrophic damages included new projects that were recently completed such as Abdullah Bridge and Tunnel that was completely submerged by the rain, according to Abdul Aziz Suwaigh's article on Medina newspaper.
Abdul Aziz Al-Suweid's article in Hayat newspaper talked about a conspiracy.
"There are new luxury constructions, inaugurated few months ago, that were damaged by the floods. We are talking about constructions that are very costly with the latest international standards and on which worked the largest construction companies in the country," said Suweid.
"If the situation continues as it was, without any declared accountability and real transparency, it is expected that the tragedy will recur. But such tragedies might be an "opportunity" for new constructions and enterprises and new needs. Billions of riyals whose benefits do not come to ordinary people," added Suweid.
To refute the "allegations" that the cause of the disaster is "ramshackle buildings" in the valleys and streams, "alsaha" website published several pictures of King Abdullah University after the disaster, and asked: "Is it possible that this is the university that cost billions and does not have drainage of rain water?"
It is time for accountability
"The disaster must be a turning point to open a file of grand corruption through the creation of legislative body that will enable people to prosecute the corrupt through independent civil organisations," wrote lawyer and human rights activist Abdul Rahman al-Lahem in an article entitled "Jeddah and the Fat Cats."
"The blood of innocent people who lost their lives must not go in vain. They are the dead of corruption," said Lahem.
"I hope the disaster will push those who worry about the nation and its future to seek the establishment of an organisation to combat corruption at the Ministry of Social Affairs and prosecute thieves of public funds," he added.
Lahem's view is shared by many writers, including Saleh Mohammed al-Shaihi, who stressed in Watan newspaper that the liability had been accumulating over the years.
"If we are serious and honest, we must look for the roots of the problem," said Shaihi, calling for those who had been behind the tragedy to be held accountable.
"Open the files of companies that still wear the mantle of nationalism, those that swallowed billions in exchange of stones that were swept away by a passing cloud .. give us an account of projects that have been awarded over the past years .. give us a list of businessmen whose companies and institutions amassed the billions, but failed their work," demanded Shaihi.
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