Contradiction and lies in King Salman’s speech before the Shura Council

King Salman’s annual address to the Shura Council brought a series of contradictions, lies, and many untrue and far-fetched claims.

King Salman has argued that Aramco’s investment would bring a paradigm shift in the Saudi market to international markets, allow investors from inside and outside the Kingdom to participate and create thousands of jobs.

However, these claims lie in reality. Aramco’s IPO is facing a stumbling block that has prompted regime officials to cancel Aramco’s IPO promotions in Asia, Europe and America.

The company this week canceled promotions in New York and London after it decided not to sell stocks directly to investors in developed markets and to go ahead with a highly focused local market offering instead.

Aramco has set a benchmark price for the deal, valuing the company up to $1.7 trillion, less than the $2 trillion targeted by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, but putting it on track to become the world’s largest IPO.

On the other hand, King Salman claimed that the Kingdom is continuing its way to achieve more achievements through the vision of 2030, which was promoted by his son, Crown Prince Mohammed frequently claiming that it is a lifeline for the economy of the Kingdom.

But in reality there is a failure to attract major international investors and the outlook for failure is clouded by Vision 2030 in an unprecedented crisis in the Kingdom’s economy.

The Kingdom’s economy is suffering from continued decline in crude oil exports to 6.67 million barrels per day, and financial revenues as a result of the decline in crude oil prices, amid the rise in public debt to 167 billion dollars.

The Kingdom’s courts witnessed 500 bankruptcy cases of large companies in light of austerity in services and the departure of a large number of businessmen, and foreign exchange reserves declined to about 487 billion dollars in addition to the decline in the trade balance surplus by 6.1% equivalent to 4 billion dollars.

In another context, King Salman claimed that the regime is continuing its efforts to reduce unemployment for young men and women, but the data of the Statistics Authority revealed that they are 367 Saudis are leaving the labor market daily and unemployment is increasing.

He claimed that the attacks on the Kingdom’s oil installations, united the world before the criminal Iranian regime, but the great ally of the Kingdom of America left it alone in the face of Iran after targeting oil installations.

King Salman spoke of restoring production capacity at our facilities in record time, but the kingdom may need months to return to normal oil production.

He claimed that the Kingdom was attacked with missiles and drones, but nevertheless the lives of citizens were not affected, but in fact the people of Najran and Jazan were exposed to great risks and migration from their areas due to Houthi bombing.

He said that the Riyadh agreement on the political solution in Yemen opens the door to understandings to reach a comprehensive political solution, but the agreement between the Yemeni government and separatists do not ask them to abandon their demands for a separate state.

He pointed out that he will continue efforts to empower women in the Kingdom, but in fact the Saudi women in the prisons of the authorities are tortured, harassed and threatened with rape and murder.

He said that the Saudis deal with tourists in accordance with the principles of Saudi Arabia and Islam and the established traditions of the Saudi society, but the Kingdom allows unmarried tourists to share hotel rooms and many other things forbidden in the Kingdom.

“We have succeeded in eliminating the manifestations of extremism by all means, but at the moment extremism has become more ugly by imposing things far from the traditions of the kingdom and the conservative Saudi society,” he said.