MP Marzouk Al-Ghanem, a liberal who is considered to be the representative of the merchant’s community, was elected as the new speaker of the Assembly throughout the four-year term after scoring 36 votes compared to 18 votes scored by MP Ali Al-Rashed, the speaker of the scrapped assembly.
Al-Ghanem boycotted last December election in protest against the amendment to the electoral law, but decided to take part in the July polls after the Constitutional Court confirmed the amendment. Ghanem told the House that Kuwait should open a new page to push forward the wheels of development.
“We seek to pull the country out of escalation in the coming phase”, he noted, adding that “This new phase requires young leadership and new thoughts to reflect the aspirations of the nation. It requires leadership that represents balance and moderation and works to promote a spirit of cooperation and responsibility,” he stated.
Born in 1968, Al-Ghanem holds a bachelors degree in mechanical engineering. He has held a number of positions, including Chairman of Boubyan Petrochemicals. He was first elected MP in 2006. Al-Ghanim considers himself an independent deputy and generally votes with the other liberal-leaning, businessman members.
Al-Ghanem hopes the new National Assembly will meet the ambitions of the country and its citizens in this phase of Kuwait’s history, in view of trust the citizens have bestowed in him and honor around his neck,
He hopes his colleagues and citizens will support him on the perspective that the coming phase must be led by a youth ideology to rekindle the national spirit and its ambitions.
He also commented that since representing the nation in the National Assembly since 2006 and he gained local and international experience, besides winning honor and the trust of the international community by contesting for the deputy chairmanship of International Parliamentary Union.
