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The Saudi corruption purge in 5 charts and tables

Mohammed bin Salman’s crackdown on corruption briefly reappeared on the radar of international media outlets this week with the news that Prince Muteb bin Abdullah, previously head of the Saudi national guard, had been released and that the Riyadh Ritz (pictured) had re-opened after being used as a luxury prison for those detainees with a high public profile. The story is far from over however, and we expect this to be amongst the first of many accommodations reached with the anti-corruption committee.

Using data from our proprietary online platform ClarifiedBy.com, we have generated five tables and charts which shine a light on the corporate profiles and connections of the highest profile detainees.

Figure 1 – names and connections

At ClarifiedBy.com we rate individuals by the number of connections they have, meaning directorships, corporate shareholdings and official positions. This is how our detainees stack up:

Name Profile Connections
Saleh Abdullah Mohamed Kamel Businessman 106
Bakr Mohamed Awadh Binladin Chairman of Saudi Binladin Group 66
Al Waleed Talal Abdulaziz Al Saud
Chairman of Kingdom Holding 45
Turki Abdullah Abdulaziz Abdulmrahman Faisal Turki Al Saud Former Governor of Riyadh Province 39
Amro Abdullah Mohamed Ali Abu Al Qassim Al Dabbagh Former Governor of Saudi General Investment Authority (SAGIA) 28
Waleed Ibrahim Abdulaziz Al Ibrahim Owner of television network MBC 27
Khaled Abdullah Abdulaziz Al Mulhem Former Director-General of Saudi Arabian Airlines 21
Adel Mohamed Abdul Qader Faqeeh Minister of Economy and Planning 12
Abdullah Sultan Mohamed Al Sultan Commander of the Saudi Navy 10
Ibrahim Abdulaziz Abdullah Al Assaf Former Finance Minister 7
Muteb Abdullah Abdulaziz Abdulmrahman Faisal Turki Al Saud Former Minister of the National Guard 6
Saud Majed Abdulaziz Faisal Al Duwaish Former Chief Executive of Saudi Telecom 6
Turki Nasser Abdulaziz Al Saud Former Head of the Presidency of Meteorology and Environment 5
Khaled Abdulaziz Abdulmohsin Al Tuwaijri Former Head of the Royal Court 5
Mohamed Abdulrahman Abdulmohsin Al Tubaishi Former Head of Protocol at the Royal Court 3
Fahd Abdullah Mohamed Abdulrahman Al Saud Former Deputy Defence Minister 1
Mohamed Hussain Ali Al Amoudi Businessman 1

Figure 2 – Prince Al Waleed bin Talal

The most well-connected royal is, perhaps unsurprisingly, Prince Al Waleed bin Talal whose personal wealth was the subject of a well-publicised spat with Forbes in 2013. Here we show his key holdings i.e. those companies of which he holds more than a 10% stake.

alwaleed-2

Figure 3 – three degrees of separation

Using our proprietary software designed to establish connections between companies or individuals, we found that many of these individuals were linked to each other via shared or indirect corporate interests. For example, there is a mere three degrees of separation between Bakr Binladin and Waleed Al Ibrahim:

degreesofseparation

Figure 4 – Saudi White Cement Company

Three of those on the list converge on a single entity, Saudi White Cement Company, a private company specialising in the manufacture of cement and cement products:

saudiwhitecement-768x458

Figure 5 – most common sectors

From the combined 290 companies and organisations associated with our list of 17 detainees, we were able to group them together into sectors:

saudipurgesectors-1024x726

 

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