Saudi Arabia: Time for the old men to give way | The Economist

FOR all the attention Egypt’s stricken Hosni Mubarak received this week, the death of another antediluvian hardliner in the Arab world’s other great power is more significant. Prince Nayef, heir apparent to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, epitomised the ruling family’s resistance to change. The interior ministry, which he ran for the past 37 years, has been the bane of reformers. So far there has been no sign that his death will free the forces of change. But time is no longer on the side of the House of Saud. If it wants to survive, the ageing royal family needs to get moving.

By far the biggest and richest country in the Arabian peninsula, Saudi Arabia is the font of Islam and the producer that does most to set the global oil price. For Prince Nayef and his fellow princes, the kingdom has been an oasis of stability and common sense in a sea of chaos and revolutionary excess. The Arab spring is anathema to them. They hate and fear both the secular revolutionaries and the Muslim Brotherhood. Although they discreetly backed the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi in Libya because his regime seemed even more dangerous than the alternative, they viewed the fall of Mr Mubarak as a disaster.

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