We knew that the bedoons are without nationalities, but what we did not know, until recently due to a statement by Education Ministry Assistant Undersecretary for Private Education, is that the bedoons of Kuwait are (bedoons telephonat) without phones. This is a new idiom we did not realize before, because bedoons are not only deprived from being without a nationality, but also by not having phone numbers that enable the authorities to contact them!

They do not have telephones, or the numbers they have are registered by mistake, and this is not a problem as long as the existence of bedoons as a people is not recognized by the state and they are dealt with on this basis. The truth of their “existence” is decided according to the color of the ID the Central Committee on bedoons (the name is too long and boring and I am not going to bother myself with remembering it), and the bedoons are supposed to have a phone number as long as they have a colored ID stating their legal status on the priority scale of granting Kuwaiti nationality, and with this phone number for bedoons, which is not a unified civil number as on our civil ID cards. It is possible to call the outstanding Bedouin students and honor them, just like the rest of Kuwaiti and non-Kuwaiti students.

But this did not take place, according to the assistant undersecretary, as their phone numbers were written down by mistake, although the bedoons and non-Kuwaitis had the lions share among the outstanding students, and they are a minority, yet the simple honors ceremony did not include them. They also feel bad because admission at Kuwait University is very limited for bedoons, so no matter how outstanding the student is, admission at Kuwait University will be very difficult, if not impossible, in other words ,not only the doors of nationality, not only the doors of making a living, are closed, but also the doors of graduate education.

Oil prices are down and expected to drop further as the world economic crises escalates, and we heard so much from officials and non-officials that the true investment is that of investing in people and this means utilizing the human competencies, developing and encouraging them, especially since special advantages are special for Kuwaitis, and this is normal if it does not reach the spoiling level, though we also know that it has been a custom in the countries of influentials and wastas that advantages are only given to the elite. So what if we think about giving the outstanding bedoons special treatment in university admissions and to consider their outstanding achievements in school, university or work in Kuwait as being “sublime services” that qualify them for becoming part of the Kuwaiti nationality (along with the phone numbers), is not this an investment in people, and it is more noble than trading in humans.