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