What to do About Bahrain? A Headache For Both Obama and Blatter

What to do About Bahrain? A Headache For Both Obama and Blatter
Written by James M. Dorsey

US president Barak Obama and Sepp Blatter, the head of world soccer body FIFA, share the same headache: what to do about Bahrain?

So far, Messrs. Obama and Blatter have essentially shied away from confronting the issue of the suppression of pro-democracy demonstrators, including some of the country’s most prominent soccer players.

The protests in February and March that started with Shiites and Sunnis standing shoulder to shoulder were an expression of frustration about years of failed dialogue over the need for more equitable housing and land policies, fairer representation in parliament and constitutional reform.

The crackdown and the government’s insistence that Iran had instigated the protests aided by a Shiite fifth column transformed the situation into one of sectarian tension. To be sure, there was violence on both sides of the sectarian and political divide during the protests but healing of the wounds is likely to prove difficult if not impossible without a genuine dialogue and members of the security forces being held accountable.

The US has been quietly but unsuccessfully urging King Khalifa for years to engage in a dialogue that would lead to democracy. Mr. Obama in May cautioned that it was difficult to conduct a national dialogue with people who have been incarcerated. Bahrain has since released a number of its detainees, including opposition members of parliament and national team players, but referred some of them to security courts.

Mr. Blatter has questioned the Bahrain Football Association (BFA) about credible reports of retribution against the soccer players and officials who allegedly had participated in the anti-government demonstrations as well as predominantly Shiite Muslim clubs. The FIFA president however appears to have accepted at face value the BFA’s statement that no sports players or officials were disciplined or harassed because of their association with the people power uprising earlier this year that was brutally crushed – a statement that flies in the face of reporting in Bahrain’s state-controlled media and reports by people involved in Bahraini soccer.

For both Mr. Obama and Mr. Blatter, the issue is what is the price of postponing the inevitable?

The widespread sense of discontent remains with a deeper than ever sectarian divide that makes the status quo in Bahrain unsustainable. The crackdown has pushed the uprising out of the capital and reduced it to street skirmishes in villages. A government-inspired national dialogue has all but failed. An independent investigation into the crackdown has yet to prove its integrity and independence but is credited for some of the prisoner releases. …more