Following are excerpts from statements made by former Jordanian MP Ahmad Uweidi Abadi and posted on the Internet in the course of 2011 and 2012.
January 18, 2012:
Ahmad Uweidi Abadi: "A republican regime in Jordan is bound to come. I don't think it will take more than two years at the most. A republican regime embodies the will of the people through elections, whereas the monarchic regime has become a thing of the past, which does not reflect the will of the people. The king does not rise to power by the will of the people, but by his own will, and he therefore treats the people as a herd of subjects. We want to have a president of a republic who would treat the people as the ones who elected him, and who brought him to his position. […]
"The King forged an alliance with the domestic and foreign enemies of Jordan against the Jordanians."
Interviewer: "How? With whom?"
Ahmad Uweidi Abadi: "I don't want to be specific – domestic and foreign enemies against the Jordanians, so that if he leaves or flees – call it as you like – a civil war would break out. […]
"We don't want a civil war. We want life in our country to be good and honorable. Therefore, the King must return to his senses, and realize that the will of the Jordanian people, and especially that of the tribes and the army veterans, is not what it used to be. We are not cattle in a pen. We are not a herd of sheep. We are cultured and educated people who achieve high degrees. […]
"Constitutional monarchy is completely unacceptable. Let's assume that [King Abdallah] becomes a constitutional monarch – where are the billions that he, his wife, and his brothers took? Does that mean that the money of the Jordanian people would go to his coffers? […]
"We Jordanians are people of honor, but he treats us with the utmost contempt. What constitutional monarchy?! Who made him king upon us?! Who made the [Hashemites] kings upon us? The first King Abdallah said: I have come to visit Jordan in order to occupy it. By their own logic they are occupiers. He calls himself an occupier but he wants us to call him king? He is an occupier, and Jordan must be liberated from this Hashemite family." […]
Interviewer: "The bottom line of what you are saying is that the King is not qualified to rule this country."
Ahmad Uweidi Abadi: "The entire Hashemite family, the King included, is not qualified. […]
"Someone on behalf of the King came to negotiate [a compromise] with me. I asked him: Is there a poet among you? He said: No. I asked him if there was a philosopher, an engineer, a doctor, or a historian among them, and he said: No. I said: My brothers and I by ourselves hold all these titles, so how come you rule us?! What qualifies you to rule me?"
Interviewer: "What do you think about the mentality of Prince Hassan?"
Ahmad Uweidi Abadi: "Forget it, they are all the same." […]
Jarash, Jordan
June 29, 2011:
"If I were in the position of the King, or of Ranya, or of the intelligence agencies, or of the government, I would not lose any sleep over all these gatherings and marches, because none of these gatherings targets the mastermind behind the corruption. […]
"Someone who sells out our homeland, sells out our people, plunders our country, humiliates and degrades us, and within a decade, gives Jordanian citizenship to two million people, in violation of the law and the constitution – is he not a criminal, a corrupter, a deceiver, and a killer? […]
"We declare: Ranya, you destroyed this country. Ranya, you and your cronies plundered this country. If you say this, I'm with you, but if not, I will not be with you. […]
"There are people in this country who form [private] armies, and they plan to fight us. We do not plan to fight, but by Allah, my brothers, if… A serpent's poison is in its head. My brothers, either we call a spade a spade, or it will be just talk. By Allah, the Jordanian people is fed up. […]
"They can go and shoot me, but I won't ask for their permission. Why should I!?! This is my country. I didn't come to this country yesterday. I have been here for a million years. I award legitimacy to them, not the other way around. Look, they say that our legitimacy is something they kindly bestow upon us. Our education – they bestow it upon us. Our democracy – they bestow it upon us. To hell with all that bestowing. What, everything is bestowed upon us by them? Even sleeping with our wives?! What shamelessness is this? It is inconceivable." […]
September 23, 2011:
"I am speaking on behalf of the Jordanian national movement. We have no problem with the government, the secret service, America, or Israel. We have no problem with the Palestinian issue either. Our problem is with the Hashemite family, with the political Hashemite entity. Apart from that, we have no problem. […]
"We say to the King: Listen to us, before we stop listening to you, obey our ideas before we stop obeying yours, and cooperate with us, before we refuse to cooperate with you. The Koran says: 'And these days We alternate among the people.' […]
"We demand that the king give back all the property and lands that were confiscated. We demand that the King's wife and her family give back all the property. […]
"The current constitution is unconstitutional. For one thing, it deifies the King. […]
"How come it deifies the King? He's a person just like us. Another thing that we demand from the King… This country is not the private estate of kings, queens, princes, princesses, and descendents of the prophet Muhammad. This country belongs to us. This is Jordan. We have no such thing as princes, princesses, or descendents of the Prophet. [In the constitution] there are only a king and a crown prince." […]
