TheNewsGuru

Tag: Saudi Arabia

  • Saudi Arabia hosts first-ever fashion week

    Fashionable women, dark-haired Saudis and blonde Eastern Europeans alike, fill the gold-trimmed halls of Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel, marking the start of Saudi Arabia’s first-ever fashion week.

    Models and makeup artists preparing for the inaugural Saudi episode of Arab Fashion Week said they were surprised the event was taking place in the deeply conservative Muslim kingdom.

    “We are so excited because this is the first fashion week in Saudi Arabia, so we are making history,” model Anita Dmycroska said.

    Strict social restrictions have eased dramatically under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who has reined in religious police, introduced public concerts and lifted bans on cinemas and women driving.

    Yet, restrictions persist. Tuesday’s reception was open to men and cameras, but only women are permitted at catwalk events and outside photography is barred.

    Women in public places in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, wear abayas — loose-fitting, full-length robes symbolic of piety.
    With recent reforms, women in some cities have begun to don more colorful abayas, sometimes trimmed with lace and velvet or left open to reveal long skirts or jeans.

    No abayas will feature on the catwalk. The event hosts invitation-only fashion viewings and a Harvey Nichols pop-up store in a tent that was still being erected hours before the first show.

    Another tent holds the catwalk, featuring designers from Brazil, Lebanon, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United States and the United Arab Emirates.

    The event, initially scheduled for last month, was postponed because of delays in issuing visas.

    Industry figures from Italy, Russia and Lebanon flocked to Riyadh, many for the first time, to admire the work of local and international designers.

    Layla Issa Abouzeid, Saudi Arabia country director for the Dubai-based Arab Fashion Council (AFC) organizing the event, said 1,500 people were expected to attend, including 400 from abroad.

    She hopes the event will bring revenue into the kingdom and highlight local talent.

    “When people go to Paris on the Paris Fashion week, the hotels are completely fully booked,” she said. “I want to create the same demand in Saudi Arabia, twice a year. I want to create a platform for the local designers to go worldwide.”

    Lebanese designer Naja Saade came to Riyadh to display his couture collection.

    “I’m very proud to participate in this first edition of Arab Fashion Week in Saudi Arabia, because it’s a part of the revolution of the women in this country,” he said.

    By bringing talent from Europe and placing international brands on the same catwalk as Arab brands, he hopes to elevate local fashion designers.

    AFC wants to introduce fashion courses, internships and scholarships to Saudi Arabia and develop a fashion district in Riyadh.

    Jacob Abrian, AFC founder and chief executive, said many Arabs have had to leave their countries to have fashion careers, but this recurring event allows them to stay in the region.

    “I was always asking myself, why do us Arabs have to travel abroad to find our future? Why can’t we find our future in our own countries?”

  • Black Panther to be first film shown publicly in Saudi Arabia

    Marvel blockbuster, Black Panther will break Saudi Arabia’s 35-year long cinema ban, becoming the first movie to be shown publicly in the Oil-rich country since they were shuttered in the 1980s.

    The Marvel superhero film will receive a gala opening on April 18 in Saudi Arabia’s brand new AMC theater in Riyadh, the country’s capital.

    The Luxurious cinema house, which boasts 600 leather seats and marble bathrooms, is a showpiece of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman‘s drive to reinvent and reform the ultra-conservative Muslim country.

    Black Panther is a 2018 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.

    It is the eighteenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). The film is directed by Ryan Coogler, who co-wrote the screenplay with Joe Robert Cole, and stars Chadwick Boseman as T’Challa / Black Panther, alongside Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, and Andy Serkis.

    Black Panther has earned over $1.2 billion in global sales, making it the tenth highest-grossing film in history, according to Box Office Mojo. It also became the most-tweeted about film ever, racking up 35 million mentions.

     

  • U.S. firm gets first licence to operate cinemas in Saudi Arabia

    U.S. firm gets first licence to operate cinemas in Saudi Arabia

    Saudi Ministry of Culture and Information on Wednesday said it had given U.S.-based firm — AMC — the first licence to operate cinemas in the kingdom.

     

    Saudi Minister of Culture and Information, Awwad Alawwad, said in a statement that AMC planned to open Saudi Arabia’s first cinema theatre in the capital Riyadh on April 18.

     

    He added that “the granting of the first licence marked the opening of very significant opportunities for exhibitors.”

     

    Alawwad added that the Saudi market was large, with majority of the population under the age of 30 and eager to watch their favourite films at home.

     

    In December, Saudi authorities announced the re-opening of cinemas in the country, lifting a 35-year-old ban.

     

    The move was part of the kingdom’s Vision 2030 plan, launched by Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman in a bid to open up the country for investors and to diversify the kingdom’s economy.

     

    According to the culture minister’s statement, Saudi Arabia expects to have nearly 350 cinemas, with over 2,500 screens by 2030.

     

    The 32-year-old crown prince was believed to be behind the lifting of ban on women driving in the kingdom, a move that would go into effect in June.

    Saudi Arabia lifts historic ban, allows women to drive

  • FG to engage Saudi Arabian authorities over Nigerians on death row

    FG to engage Saudi Arabian authorities over Nigerians on death row

    The federal government said it would continue to engage Saudi Arabian authorities in negotiations over the fate of Nigerians on death row for alleged drug trafficking in that country.

    The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, made this known while fielding questions from journalists in Abuja on Friday.

    The minister’s reaction followed report that there were no fewer than 25 Nigerian drug suspects held in several prisons in Saudi Arabia.

    The report indicated that 15 of the suspects were on death row, while three had been executed, leading to a call on federal government to intervene.

    Mr. Onyeama, however, said necessary steps were being taken by Federal Government to engage Saudi Arabian authorities on the matter.

    He explained that “regarding Nigerians on death row abroad, we have made very strong intercession over the issue with the government of those countries to review the cases and not to execute them.

    “However, you know that there is a limit because these are sovereign countries which have their rules and laws.

    “But as far as the Saudi Arabia is concerned, we have been intervening at government level with authorities of that country.”

    The minister added that government was working with some Non-Governmental Organisations on the matter.

  • Saudi Arabia appoints first spokeswoman

    Saudi Arabia appointed its first female spokesperson at its embassy in Washington, hours after Saudi women were granted the right to drive.

    “Proud to serve the @SaudiEmbassyUSA as the spokeswoman. I’m grateful for the opportunity, the support, and well wishes,” the spokeswoman, Fatimah Baeshen, wrote on Twitter.

    Baeshen previously worked at the ministries of labour and economy between 2014 and 2017, according to the Saudi-owned Al Arabiya broadcaster.

    She also worked as a consultant at the World Bank and the Islamic Development Bank.

    On Tuesday, King Salman ordered the Interior Ministry to give “licences to women and men equally.”

    The move, which will go into effect in June, comes after Saudi women and international rights groups have for several years campaigned to lift the ban, which was condemned as a symbol of oppression.

    Saudi Arabia is dominated by the puritanical Wahhabi school of Islam, but the kingdom has been introducing slow-paced change.

    Saudi women were allowed to vote and run as candidates in the municipal elections for the first time in 2015.

    King Salman recently ordered an end to the long-standing guardianship rule, which denied women access to government services if they did not have a male relative’s consent.

    However, women continue to require a male guardian’s approval to travel abroad or get married.

    NAN.

  • Saudi Arabia lifts historic ban, allows women to drive

    The Government of Saudi Arabia will from next June allow women to drive in the country.

    This was contained in a statement by the state media on Tuesday, making the country, the last country to allow women drive.

    This decision which effectively risks riling religious conservatives and comes as part of the government’s major reform drive, conceived by powerful Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

    “The royal decree will implement the provisions of traffic regulations, including the issuance of driving licences for men and women alike,” the Saudi Press Agency said.

    It added that authorities are aiming to have the necessary arrangements in place by June 2018.

    As news of the decision,filtered out, scores of people of both sexes, took to the street, dancing and generally celebrating the announcement.

    Also as part of the reforms,Women would also be allowed into sports stadium, to watch a musical concert, thus creating plans in tandem with its “Vision 2030” plan for social and economic reform.

    The country has more than half the country aged under 25, thus making Prince Mohammed, the architect of Vision 2030, provide platforms of entertainment options for the youth and promoting more women in the workforce.

     

  • Saraki off to Saudi Arabia for Hajj

    President of the Senate, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, on Monday night flew out of Abuja to Saudi Arabia to join the two million Muslim faithful gathered in the holy land for this year’s hajj.

    In a statement by his Special Adviser (Media and Publicity), Yusuph Olaniyonu, the President of the Senate will spend the period of the pilgrimage to pray for the unity, stability and development of Nigeria as well as better health for the leader of the country, President Muhammadu Buhari.

    He will also spend the period of the holy pilgrimage to pray for more success for the Eighth National Assembly in the execution of its Legislative Agenda which is aimed at helping to improve the standard of living of the citizenry and positively transform the national economy.

    The President of the Senate is expected back early September when the Hajj rites would have been completed by pilgrims.

  • 198 illegal migrants in Saudi Arabia return to Nigeria

    The Federal Government on Saturday received no fewer than 198 Nigerians illegally residing in Saudi Arabia at the Malam Aminu Kano International Airport at about 10 am.

    The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that this number was out of the 1,800 Nigerians living illegally in Saudi Arabia, who were given amnesty to return to the country.

    The 198 persons including women and children returned with their luggage on board a Med-View aircraft.

    Officials of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) in Kano received the first batch of the returnees.

    Mohammed Yahaya-Sani, the Consular at the Nigerian Consulate in Jedda, Saudi Arabia, who led the illegal immigrants to Nigeria, told newsmen at the airport that the Federal Government sponsored their return.

    According to him, the illegal migrants voluntarily reported to the Nigerian Embassy to be returned to Nigeria in compliance with the three months evacuation notice issued to them by Saudi authorities, which will expire on July 24.

    Yahaya-Sani said that contrary to speculations, the returnees were not deported rather they voluntarily accepted the amnesty offer granted them by the Saudi authorities for illegal immigrants to leave the country.

    “They decided on their own to return to Nigeria. The Saudi authorities offered amnesty to all illegal immigrants to leave the country within three months,” he said.

    The official handed over the returnees to NEMA officials at the airport who witnessed and documented their returns before they later departed to their various towns and villages.

  • BREAKING: Nigeria,Saudi Arabia, 16 other countries announce end of Ramadan, Sunday is Eid-el-Fitr

    Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Malaysia, Indonesia the United Arab Emirates and 15 other countries have announced an end to this year’s Ramadan Fast.

    President-General of the Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs and Sultan of Sokoto, His Eminence, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar III, announced this evening that the crescent moon of Shawwal has been sighted in Borno, Adamawa and other places.

    Nigeria and the countries where the moon has been sighted to mark the end of the fasting period have, therefore fixed Sunday as the first day of Eid-el-Fitr 1438.

    Eid al-Fitr is usually commemorated to mark the end of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan.

    According to Al jazeera television, “Turkey and Muslim communities in North America, Europe and Australia had previously announced they would celebrate Eid al-Fitr from Sunday June 25 based on astronomical calculations.

    “Oman, however, has not sighted the moon, and thus declared Monday June 26 as the first day of Eid al-Fitr.

    “Bangladesh, Pakistan, India will be sighting the moon on Sunday. These countries started Ramadan on May 28 and so Sunday will be the 29th of Ramadan for them.”

    All the countries who have confirmed Sunday as Eid-el-Fitr are Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Iraq (Sunnis), Indonesia, Jordan, Kuwait, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Lebanon, Malaysia, UAE, UK, United States and Yemen.

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that Nigeria is yet to announce the sighting of the moon.

    However, the TheNewsGuru.com reports that the Federal Government on Thursday declared Monday and Tuesday (June 26 and 27) next week public holidays to mark the 2017 Eid-El-Fitr celebrations.

  • Just In: Saudi King ousts nephew, names 31year old son as heir to throne

    King Salman of Saudi Arabia has ousted his nephew as crown prince and replaced him with his son, Mohammed bin Salman, confirming the 31-year-old as heir to the kingdom and consolidating its move to reassert its influence as a regional power.

    The king’s decision to elevate his son, who already controlled the defense, oil and economy portfolios, was supported by 31 out of 34 members of the Allegiance Council, made up of senior members of the ruling Al Saud family. In a royal decree, King Salman also relieved Crown Prince Muhammad bin Nayef from his post as Interior Minister.

    The decision settles what many analysts had described as a power struggle between Prince Mohammed, who has led an aggressive expansion of the country’s foreign policy, and his cousin. The elevation of the king’s son, known as MBS, came sooner than many expected. Prince Muhammad bin Nayef backed the royal decrees in a letter to King Salman, according to a senior Saudi official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

    “Prince Mohammed bin Salman has really been the powerful man in Saudi Arabia ever since his appointment as deputy crown prince,” Ghanem Nuseibeh, founder of Cornerstone Global Associates, said by phone. The decision “removes impediments that he had, in that he had someone more senior to him who was perhaps a bit more conservative. Now he’ll have a freer hand,” Nuseibeh said.

    The change gives Prince Mohammed greater authority to pursue his plan to reduce the kingdom’s reliance on oil, which includes selling a stake in oil giant Saudi Aramco and putting other assets under the control of a sovereign wealth fund he also heads. As defense minister, the prince oversees the war in Yemen against pro-Iranian Shiite rebels. He’s also a key figure in the current standoff with Qatar.

    State television aired a video showing Prince Mohammed bin Nayef pledging his allegiance in a meeting with the new crown prince. The younger prince bent down on his knees before his cousin and repeatedly kissed his hand.

    “May god help you,” Prince Mohammed bin Nayef told him. “I can’t do without your instructions,” the younger prince replied.

    The decrees were issued hours after the dawn meal that starts the daily fast in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, and the streets of downtown Riyadh were quiet Wednesday morning, with no sign of increased security presence.

    King Salman also retroactively reinstated all allowances and bonuses that were canceled or suspended to civil servants and military personnel, the Saudi Press Agency reported.