NEWS: Saudi Arabia offers Mark Zuckerberg $250-billion to buy Facebook and arrest the pro-democracy activists
According to
al-Okaz –a Saudi Arabian daily newspaper– the Saudi Prince Mohammad Bin
Salman ,the deputy crown prince and the youngest minister of defense in
the world, offered to procure the world’s largest social network for
nearly twice as much its current valuation. Market analysts believe the
Saudi motivation is to stifle the rising tide of pro-democracy
demonstrations in the oil-rich kingdom.
"His Royal Highness Prince Mohammad Bin
Salman met with Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday to
express his Majesty King Salman's displeasure with Facebook Corporation
for having allowed outlawed groups to organize their criminal
activities," Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported as the flamboyant prince
visits Washington, D.C.
In the meantime, the controversial New
York-based investment Morgan Stanley Inc. , which made a US
$11.5-billion investment in Facebook last March on behalf of both itself
and its non-U.S. clients, made a cogent presentation to the Saudi
monarch in which it expressed firm's readiness to assist the Saudi
regime to put an immediate end to the increasing pro-democracy
protests.
Wael Ghonim, the Google Inc. marketing
executive in Egypt who organized 2011 pro-democracy protests --via
Facebook-- in that country which overthrew the Egyptian dictator Hosni
Mubarak , vehemently condemned the Saudi offer.
"In what is being termed as pure Wall
street Gordon Gecko tactics, King Salman of Saudi Arabia has decided to
make an offer of $250 billion to buy out Facebook. My inside sources
within the kingdom suggest that he is very upset with Mr. Zukerberg for
allowing the pro-democracy uprising to get out of control. In a personal
meeting between Mark Zuckerberg and Prince Mohammad Bin Salman,
Zuckerberg had allegedly promised that he would not allow any revolt
pages to be formed on Facebook," Wael Ghonim told Middle East News
Agency (MENA).
Awful people and awful regime. Anyone who supports free speech and human dignity should refuse any business or political deals with the Saudi's. They will continue to misuse their influence over these industries.
ReplyDeleteThanks for commenting.
ReplyDeleteYou made a very good point here (h)