AS far as breaking glass ceilings for Saudi women are concerned, the appointments last week of Sarah Al-Suhaimi as the first female chairman of the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) and Rania Mahmoud Nashar as the first female chief executive officer of a Saudi banking major, Samba Financial Group, could not be more pertinent and poignant.
While progress towards gender equality and desegregation in the kingdom only a few years ago would have been frustratingly pedantic, today, in contrast, there is an increasing awakening of a reform agenda, including gender empowerment, led from the top and piloted by the reformist scion, Mohammad Salman Al-Saud, the Deputy Crown Prince and son of the Saudi monarch, King Salman Abdulaziz Al-Saud.
Following the death of King Abdullah Abdulaziz Al-Saud in January 2015, the House of Saud took the bold decision to skip a generation and instal a much younger succession more in line with the demographics of the kingdom, where about 70 per cent of the population is under 30.
While the reform agenda in Saudi Arabia feigns to unravel a web of tribal, socio-cultural and ideological complexities and usher the oil-rich kingdom into the 21st century in pursuit of ambitious targets as set out in The National Transformation Plan and Vision 2030, this policy is, at best, a “work in progress” and may take a generation to effect.
But, in terms of the advancement of women, especially in finance and the economy, the kingdom is on the verge of taking that great leap forward. Saudi Arabia, rightly or wrongly, is often defined by the world in terms of the position and the treatment of women in its society, which is perceived as restrictive.
But, under the above plans and the G20 Framework Working Group, of which Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and Turkey are the only three Muslim members, the aim is for women to account for 30 per cent of the workforce by 2020. Unemployment rates for both men and women in Saudi Arabia are notoriously unreliable, partly because of the way the figures are compiled.
The oft-cited unemployment figure of 34.5 per cent for Saudi women may be an under-estimate just as the eight per cent figure for Saudi men is grossly optimistic.
Hence, Riyadh, over the last few years, has restructured its Nitaqat Programme, some of which provisions are focused on promoting female Saudisation and enabling access for more qualified local women in managerial positions.
It is against this background of social and economic reforms in Saudi Arabia that the latest two landmark appointments of Sarah and Rania have materialised. Both have extensive career experience in banking and asset management.
Sarah, who is also the chief executive officer of NCB Capital, the investment banking subsidiary of National Commercial Bank (NCB), the largest bank in the kingdom, was in fact, elected as chairman by the board of Tadawul, which includes representatives of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (Sama), the central bank, the Finance and Commerce ministries, thus becoming the first woman to chair a major government financial institution in the kingdom.
In her case, it is “like father, like daughter”, as her father, Jammaz Al-Suhaimi, was the chairman of the Capital Market Authority of Saudi Arabia, the securities regulator, between 2004 and 2006, where Sarah also served as adviser to the board.
Tadawul is, in fact, a trendsetter in female empowerment. It already employs other high-flying women in executive positions, including Hanadi Abdulrahman Al-Sheikh as chief strategy officer and Aseel Mohammad Al-Barqawi as chief legal and compliance officer.
Sarah’s elevation to head Tadawul could not come at a more crucial and yet exciting time for the bourse.
At a market capitalisation of just under US$570 billion (RM2.5 trillion), it is still small by global standards, compared to the US$6.8 trillion of the London Stock Exchange and the US$5.9 trillion of the Shanghai Stock Exchange.
Yet, the bourse is expected to dramatically increase its listing size and structure over the next few years as Riyadh embarks on a selective privatisation programme, which includes the part sell-off of the state utility, Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company and exporter which Riyadh is valuing at US$2 trillion.
At the same time, Tadawul itself is earmarked to offer its own shares to the public and is trying to win emerging market status from international equity index compilers.
The other crucial challenge is for Tadawul to create an active secondary trading market for bonds and sukuk, like the one on Bursa Malaysia. Given that Malaysia and Saudi Arabia are the two largest sukuk markets in the world, accounting for almost 80 per cent of issuances, a secondary market to unlock vital liquidity that could be recycled into the economy is going to prove vital. Malaysia is currently the only country with an active secondary market for sukuk.
Similarly, Rania’s appointment to head Samba Financial Group, the third largest bank in Saudi Arabia, augurs well for the future of local women in banking.
The kingdom’s top sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund, is also recruiting Saudi women bankers to help manage its assets.
It is a far cry from a decade or so ago when it would have been unthinkable for women bankers in the kingdom to rise to the pole position of chief executive.
Spare a thought for Dr Nader Taher, chief economist of NCB, who, in 2006, had to leave the kingdom to head Gulf One Investment Bank in Bahrain, a position she could not attain in her native Saudi Arabia because of gender politics.
Spare also a thought for other trailblazers of women empowerment in Saudi finance — Lubna Al Olayan, managing director of Olayan Finance; Nabila Al-Tunisi, head of procurement at Saudi Aramco; and Samra Al-Kuwaiz, managing director of the women’s division of Osool Brokerage.
Their perseverance amid years of frustration should be equally commended as the current reform agenda of the government!
**The author is an independent London based economist and writer.