Education Minister to tackle housing allowance for teachers, fake degrees
a nation’s pride
KUWAIT CITY, March 13: Minister of Education and Higher Education Dr Mohammad Al-Fares affirmed that his main mission is to do his best in offering distinguished educational environment which will enhance achievements of Kuwaiti and expatriate teachers and students, reports Al-Anba daily.
On the sidelines of his surprise visit to a school, the minister expressed his seriousness in fulfilling his promise to teachers that they will start receiving housing allowance worth KD 150, indicating that he is just waiting for the Civil Service Commission (CSC) to issue a decision in this regard.
When asked about rumors concerning the possibility of cancelation of teachers’ current housing allowance of KD 60, the minister insisted that this is impossible.
He also stressed the need for teachers to renew their data, assuring that he will address the Finance Department regarding the reasons behind the nondisbursement of housing allowance to some teachers who renewed their data.
When asked about the appointment of teachers who do not even have bachelors’ degree, Dr Al-Fares said he has never heard of something like this, assuring that he will investigate this issue with the Legal Affairs Department.
Regarding the investigations concerning fake certificates, the minister said he will take necessary actions after receiving the final report of investigations from the fact-finding committee affiliated to the Public Authority for Applied Education and Training and the report of the fact-finding committee of Kuwait University.
He explained that there are four kinds of fake certificates — a certificate of bachelor’s, master’s or doctorate degree from a university that does not exist, a fake certificate obtained from a known university, a certificate obtained from a known university based on the enrollment system and a certificate obtained from a known university at the same time of occupying the position. Those proven to hold certificates of the first kind will be dismissed from the positions that they were promoted to based on these certificates, while those with the second, third and fourth kinds of certificates will receive suitable administrative and legal penalties.
The Al-Sabah Collection is one of the most extraordinary and celebrated private collection of Islamic art, which now also comprises artifacts from the pre-Islamic period. Such is the range, scale, and scope of the collection that it can hold its own with some of the more famous and older collections such as those in the Victoria & Albert and British Museum in London, the Louvre in Paris and the Metropolitan in New York. The Al-Sabah collection has been assembled by two discreet connoisseur collectors Sheikh Nasser Sabah AlAhmad Al-Sabah, Minister of the Amiri Diwan, and Sheikha Hussah Al-Sabah, Director General of Dar al-Athar Al Islamiyyah, a cultural organization that fosters a spirit of learning and bridges cultures. Together they have gifted Kuwait and the world, one of the largest and most comprehensive collection that showcases the range, vitality, and creativity of Islamic and pre-Islamic art in varied media such as ceramic, glass, objects of adornment, metalwork, manuscript, stone, ivory, carpets and textiles. The collection includes more than 30,000 objects of art sourced from a large geographical swathe ranging from China to Spain, dating from the 7th to the 19th century CE. “The objects in the Al-Sabah collection arouse our sensitivities and sensibilities,” remarks Salam Kaoukji (more popularly known as Sue), Chief Curator, Al-Sabah Collection. “The variety of the collection and the way it presents the continuous history of the region is very important. The objects in the collection serve to illustrate both the history of the area and the people who made and used them. And that is why this collection does not belong to Kuwait or the Arab world alone, but to the world at large and we are obliged to look after it.”
One of the highlights of the Al-Sabah collection is the magnificent body of Indian jeweled arts, parts of which was showcased in the “Treasury of the World: Jeweled Arts of India in the Age of the Mughals” exhibition. This fabled presentation which was first inaugurated at the British Museum, London in 2001 began its American tour at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. This was followed by exhibitions in leading museums of North America, Europe, and Asia. The ‘jeweled arts’ of India are important objects that are breathtakingly beautiful and renowned for their craftsmanship. “In fact, Robert Skelton, a renowned scholar and former Keeper of the Indian Department at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, said that the most suitable way to study Mughal jeweled arts was to visit the Al-Sabah collection. It is a very academic collection that breaks a lot of old taboos. For instance, it was always believed that the Europeans introduced stone cutting to the world, but a number of ancient objects in the collection demonstrate how far back stone -cutting existed in India.”
It was a passion for beauty along with an added interest in the sublimity and immensity of Islamic art and the urge to preserve, share and educate that led to the birth of one of the greatest collections of Islamic art in modern times. “Sheikh Nasser and Sheikha Hussah started collecting in the midseventies,” says Salam Kaoukji, who has had a long association with the Dar. “The collection offers considerable stimulation to scholars, and some of the most important scholars in the field are writing publications about this collection.” Salam Kaoukji is not alone in her opinion; it is shared by academics and museum professionals around the world. Marilyn Jenkins, a noted scholar who worked closely with Sheikh Nasser and Sheikha Hussah when the collection was installed at the Kuwait National Museum in 1983, describes Sheikh Nasser as an “inveterate collector and an intuitive connoisseur with a highly refined taste, trained eye and photographic memory … and a genuine love for beautiful things in general- and Islamic art in particular, which is reflected in the manner in which he cares for and lavishes attention on an object once it is his.” (Saudi Aramco 1990)
Sheikh Nasser Al-Sabah discovered his love of historic art during his schooling years in Jerusalem in the sixties. In his Preface to the “Treasury of the World” exhibition catalogue, Sheikh Nasser notes: “I was particularly enthralled by the monuments of that ancient city, especially her Islamic monuments… As part of my own heritage, these filled me with pride and planted the germ of curiosity about the extent of Islamic artistic achievements.” But the interest and dedication that Sheikh Nasser and Sheikha Hussah share for art is not selfish. They have been committed to sharing the collection with the largest number of people through Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, an organization that serves as a beacon for cultural diplomacy and knowledge building through exhibitions, publications, and cultural activities.
What is special about the Al-Sabah collection is that like its founders, it attracts people whose interest in art, history and heritage, and the ability of the same in bringing people and cultures together is not just scholarly; it is an ingrained, lifelong passion. Salam Kaoukji, Chief Curator of Al-Sabah Collection, learned to look, observe and internalize beauty and artistic details early in life. “My mother taught me the importance of “looking” at things. When you look carefully, and not just in passing, you internalize the object that you are studying, and it is then that you understand why it prevails, why it was made,and it builds an awareness about the people who manufactured it. That is when you stop thinking of people who lived in the past as Martians,” she smiles.
In many ways, Kaoukji is a product of her environment and upbringing. Born and brought up in an artistic surrounding, she grew up in a world inhabited by multiple cultures. Her mother was a miniature artist who introduced her daughter to the magical world of museums and art at a young age. “She would take me to museums and talk to me about objects,” smiles the former editor of the Arabic edition of Sesame Street, the children’ sm ag azine.Kaoukji spent her younger years in Cairo and Lebanon, absorbing and assimilating the varied artistic and cultural influences. A graphic designer by profession, she moved to Kuwait with her family during the civil war in Lebanon. She is an autodidact polymath whose creative pedigree opened her to culture, knowledge, and taste. An insatiable reader, she regards objects as repositories of knowledge that should be shared and looked after in an increasingly shallower and bite-sized world.
Long before she started work in the curatorial department, Salam Kaoukji had been a familiar presence at the exhibitions and events of Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah. Her love for art, culture, and creativity brought her closer to the Dar. “I was once visiting the Dar gallery at the Kuwait National Museum sometime in the eighties when I happened to notice a school teacher who was visiting with a group of students. I heard her giving the children a lot of
wrong information, which upset me. So I offered Sheikha Hussah, to make a booklet which would be distributed free to children, parents, and people in general who visited the gallery. The booklet included short descriptions of the periods and regions along with educational activities centering around the objects.” That was the beginning of Salam Kaoukji’s active personal engagement with the Dar which took a professional turn soon after the Gulf War.
In 1990, at the time of the Iraqi invasion, the Al-Sabah collection, was displayed at the Kuwait National Museum where it was loaned on a longterm basis to the state of Kuwait. The Iraq invasion had a devastating effect on the collection. The National Museum, where the Dar had its own gallery was ransacked, looted and gutted by the Iraqi soldiers. Homes and palaces of the ruling family were allotted as living quarters to the Iraqi National Guard. Sheikh Nasser and Sheikha Hussah’s home was plundered and pillaged, more so because the invaders knew of the connection between them and the museum. “The place was a mess,” recalls Kaoukji shaking her head. She along with Manuel Keene, then the chief curator of the collection, were the first to check on the house after the invasion. “The soldiers had broken, destroyed and looted everything they came across.”
During the invasion, the Iraqis sent staff from their Department of Antiquities to pack and transport the entire collection of Dar Al Athar Al Islamiyyah collection on display at the National Museum. Everything was removed except an exquisitely carved 14th century magnificent Moroccan wooden door. “As they could not remove and transport the heavy 4.5 meters high door, it burned down when the Iraqi soldiers torched the building. It was a great loss,” says Kaoukji. The Iraqis transported the priceless objects to Baghdad in tin trunks on the back of trucks. “They packed smaller objects in paper but the larger objects were thrown on the back of trucks with no protective packing.”
After the Iraqis had been driven out of Kuwait, the retrieval of the objects began. “Katie Marsh, who manages our office in London organized the return of property with the United Nations,” says Kaoukji, who recalls a team of curators, conservators and photographers from the Dar leaving for Baghdad armed with supplies that included trolleys, packing material, crates, and even pencils and erasers. Kirsty Norman, a conservator working with Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah at the time of the invasion recalls in an article that the handover took six weeks with the team working ten hours a day. Dar alAthar al-Islamiyyah recovered all but sixty-one objectsfrom the collection. “In the years that followed, we were only able to retrieve one Mughal dagger which dates from the period of Emperor Akbar, and that’s it,” mentions Salam Kaoukji. “Unfortunately, some of the Mughal emeralds are gone, and that is very scary. As these emeralds are very important early pieces and of superb quality,and are well-known because they have been published, they cannot be sold in the art market and so the fear is of them being cut and reused.”
But despite the temporary setback, the Al-Sabah collection has grown and flourished over the years. Objects from the collection are shown in turns as part of larger exhibitions in their galleries at the Amricani Cultural Center or are loaned out to exhibitions worldwide. And around these objects has grown a lecture series that has featured some of the finest minds in the world, along with a cultural programme which engages experts, art enthusiasts and members of public in Kuwait in a cultural dialogue that promotes better understanding based on a studied appreciation of the Islamic civilization and its contribution.