In charge of the legislative power in Kuwait is each of the crown prince and parliament (Article 51 of the constitution). That is, Kuwait adopts the principle of one council for the legislative power. This council (according to Article 80) consists of 50 members Monitoring elected by direct secret public ballot based on the provisions of the electoral law. Article 56 of the constitution requires that the number of ministers not exceed a third of the number of parliament members (16 ministers including the Prime Minister) and that the ministers be selected from among parliament members and others. Article 82 of the constitution states the conditions for running for parliament. These conditions are as follows:
A- That the candidate have a Kuwaiti nationality of an original nature in accordance with the law (citizens who been nationalized for less than 20 years are prohibited from being nominated).
B- That the candidate fulfill the voter’s conditions in accordance with the electoral law (women are prohibited from being nominated).
C- That the candidate be at least 30 years old at the date of the elections.
D- That the candidate be able to read and write the Arabic language .

The regulatory by-laws specified the work of the parliament in three domains: legislative affairs, financial affairs, and political affairs.

The legislative function consists in the parliament’s participation with the crown prince in proposing laws (in accordance with Article 65 of the constitution, which states that the crown prince has the right to propose, approve, and promulgate laws. The promulgation of laws must be within 30 days of the date of proposing them to the parliament, and this period is 7 days in the case of urgent matters. The report on the type of use is made a by a majority decision of parliament members. The law is considered approved and is promulgated if the president of the government does not request to re-examine it before the time scheduled for its promulgation.

As for Article 109, it grants the parliament member the right to propose laws. Every draft law proposed by a member and rejected by the parliament may not be presented again in the same assembly .

As for the procedure of proposing draft laws by parliament members or by the cabinet, the draft law must be brief and accompanied by a report on its rationale. The parliament refers it to the Committee for Legislative Affairs which sets down a legal framework for it and prepares a report on it if it approves it and then refers it to the Speaker of Parliament who in turn submits it to the parliament to arrange referring it to the specialized committee. This committee prepares a report on it. After that, the draft law is discussed in its entirety, approved, and if it does not receive the majority of votes, it is discussed Article by Article and voted on again. After four days, a discussion of the amendment suggested by members is made, and the law is voted on for the last time .

The parliament’s legislative function extends to discussing decretal laws issued by the crown prince in the case of the parliament’s absence (if it was dismissed or if its sessions have ended). Article 71 of the constitution stipulates that if circumstance arise, between the parliament’s sessions or during the period of its dismissal, requiring urgent measures that cannot bear delay, the crown prince may issue decrees in their regard that have the force of law as long as they do not violate the constitution or the financial considerations of the fiscal plan.

These laws must be submitted to the parliament within 15 days from the date of their issuing if the parliament is existent or during its first assembly in the case of dismissal or the end of its legislative phase. If these decrees are not submitted to the parliament, they lose their status as having the force of law with a retroactive effect without the need to issue a decree regarding that loss. If these decrees are submitted to the parliament and are not approve by it, they retroactively lose their status as having the force of law unless the parliament otherwise views the adoption of its enforcement or settling its effects .

The prince shares with the parliament its right to amend the constitution in accordance with what is required in Article 174 of the constitution, which states that the prince and a third of parliament members have the right to propose revision of this constitution by amending or deleting one or more of its provisions or by adding new provisions to it.

If the prince and the majority of members that form the parliament approve the principle of revision and its topic, the parliament discusses the proposed draft law Article by Article, and its approval is conditional on the acceptance of two thirds of members constituting the parliament. This revision does not apply until it is sanctioned and issued by the prince, except for the provisions of Articles 65 and 66 of the constitution.

If the prince rejects the revision proposal in principle or in terms of topic of revision, the proposal may not be submitted again before a period of one year from the date of this rejection. No proposal to amend this constitution may be made before the passing of 5 years of operating according to it .

2- The Parliament’s Exercise of Its Legislative Function
It has already been mentioned that the Kuwaiti prince has dismissed the parliament twice, the first time in 1976 and the second in 1986. The clash between the government and last council was expected due to the council’s delay in responding to the prince’s speech addressing it (the government work program) in addition to the existence of tensions that led to the government’s rejection of more than one draft law proposed by parliament members such as the draft law for the social guarantee of parliament members and the draft law on the retirement conditions of government employees. The cabinet of ministers resigned from office due to the difficulty of cooperating with the parliament. In addition to this, the government cancelled Articles 107, 174, and 181 of the constitution which regulate the relation between the prince and the parliament and issued a decision to form a committee to amend the constitution, followed by the prince’s decree to dismiss the parliament .

This led to an escalation of the Kuwaiti’s people’s attempts to demand the return of parliamentary life and of adhering to the cancelled constitutional Article. These attempts, which began in early December through a holding of meetings organized by a number of Kuwaiti parliament members of the dismissed council in the offices of former parliament members and led to the presentation of several petition pleading with the authorities to respond to the people’s demands. Yet the government did not exhibit a response in this matter.

However, amidst the circumstances of mutual escalation, the Kuwaiti Prince Sheikh Ahmed gave a speech to the parliament in 20/1/1990 in which he called for the practice of rationality, the resort to dialogue, the expansion of the advisory foundations, and the support of parliamentary life. This stance met with responsiveness from Kuwait parliament members and those calling for the return of parliamentary life. But the speech did not lead to any tangible progress in the government’s position. The government instead proposed a transitional formula as a replacement for the revitalization of parliamentary life expressed by founding a temporary national council with a four-year term. A third of this council’s members is assigned, and its privileges are of a consultative non-obliging nature, and it is assigned the study of the negative aspects of the previous parliamentary experience in Kuwait. This founding of this council did not meet with a positive response from the Kuwaiti people, and the conflict accelerated once again between the government on one hand and parliament members and Kuwaiti politicians on another. A number of Kuwaiti politicians were the target of many accusations such as resisting authorities and holding illegal meetings, etc. Though the prince issued a domanial pardon of them, this did not end the prevailing tension in the country.

The elections of the transitional National Council were held on 10 June 1990 in these circumstances to elect its 50 members. The Kuwaiti opposition refrained from voting to reveal the non-constitutionality of these elections and made a number of criticisms that expressed doubt about the integrity of the elections. The council inaugurated its activities on 9 July 1990.

In 2 August 1990, the Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait occurred, and with that the first term of the national council had ended only 23 days after its assembly .

3- The 1992 Parliamentary Elections
After the liberation of Kuwait, the opposition discovered that the Kuwaiti government had not implemented its promises with the speed and in the manner desired by this opposition, expressed by a delay in announcing the date of elections, then specifying it after 19 months of the government’s return to liberated Kuwait. The opposition held that this period is considered long considering the urgent need for the opposition’s return to the political arena and for providing the masses with an opportunity to share with the government the making of political decisions, specially with regard to security and military conditions, reconstruction issues, economic conditions, and holding accountable the wrongdoers and defaulters during the invasion.

However, the government made a number of decisions that shocked the opposition and its clear demands . The most important of these decisions was the formation of a cabinet of ministers from most of the former cabinet members, then summoning the national council to convene, and the refusal of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in May 1992 to allow the opposition to hold a people’s conference to discuss the latest political, economic, security, and electoral conditions. It is important to note that the parliament of 1992had cancelled the domanial decree to found the national council and by so doing, the council became legally non-existent after it had been canceled constitutionally and legislatively.

At any rate, the Kuwaiti parliamentary elections were held on 5 October 1992 and were characterized by a special importance on both the territorial and provincial levels. Holding these elections put a positive end to an insistent political demand since the end of 1989 and had a strong impact on political reform demands in the Arab Gulf countries.

The elections were held under an electoral law that was a topic under criticism because it contracts the volume of voters by around 13% of the total population and deprives important sectors of the Kuwaiti people from practicing their political rights. The elections were also held in the absence of frank party pluralism. Despite these two facts, the elections were generally positive because the electoral campaign were characterized by a high degree of frankness and raised many sensitive issued without embarrassment such as the demand to hold accountable the officials who were defaulters during the Gulf War, the necessity of the separation of authorities, and the consolidation of the parliament particularly in the supervisory and financial domains. There were no complaints of administrative interference in the electoral process. The elections resulted in the opposition’s occupation of two thirds of parliamentary seats .

4- The 1992 Parliament’s Legislative Performance
The Kuwaiti parliamentary experience—which in practice consists of an actual non-codified pluralism of a notable progress expressed by an expansion of the elected parliament’s role in supervision, impeachment, and demanding wider privileges from the council in its relation to the executive power. Also raised in the council was the need to reconsider all the laws issued in its absence though the constitutional court had judged these laws as constitutional. Yet this problem was overcome . After the parliament approved the report of the Committee for Legislative and Legal Affairs on approving the 25 decrees issued during the dismissal of the council, it refused to approve the decree requiring the amendment of some of the provisions if the law of the government security court issued during the same period.

Members raise numerous important issues related to the legal authorities and to topics related to human rights issues. Parliament members demanded the reinstatement of Law no. 13 of 1963 regarding congregations and public processions and which cancelled Law no. 65 of 1979. This demand took the form of a draft law submitted by 5 parliament members to amend the law of congregation in a way compatible with the new Kuwaiti reality.

Some parliament members raised the issue of giving women the right to vote in public elections and their right to candidacy. The parliament also witnessed important discussion on the nationality law during the discussion of the draft law submitted by the Committee for Legislative and Legal Affairs to unify nationality and settle the status of bedouins and during the discussion of the draft law submitted by 5 parliament members to amend the sixth Article of the nationality law to give nationalized citizens the right to participate in the elections after only ten years of receiving the nationality.

In the field of the guarantee of human rights in penal laws, 5 parliament members proposed a draft law on amending Article 9 of the Law of Penal Procedures and Courts to give the District Attorney the authority to initiate the prosecution of all crimes.

In another respect, 5 parliament members proposed a draft law to cancel Article 19 on the law on passports, an Article which gives the Minister of Internal Affairs the right to prevent individuals from leaving the country for reasons valued at his discretion .

The year 1994 witnessed distinct performance by the Kuwaiti parliament on the level of legislative work. That year began with the parliament’s sustained position demanding the cancellation of the law of putting ministers to trial issued in 1990 in the absence of democracy. The parliament, through its demand of this law’s cancellation, aimed at guaranteeing a true trial of those accused of Kuwaiti petrol transport companies. At the forefront of these was the former Minister of Finance and Petrol (Sheikh Ali Al-Khalifah As-Sabbah). The parliament also wanted to guarantee that the trial is carried out in accordance with the law of regular penal procedures and trials. The parliament was indeed successful in eliminating the law of putting ministers on trial in 12 January 1994.

In another vein, the parliament’s role emerged in the issue of amending the law of nationality which lead to the government’s issuing in January 1994 of an amendment in the law of nationality permitting Kuwaitis born to fathers who received the nationality by nationalization to participate in the next legislative elections (1996) after this participation had been restricted to those who received the nationality in an original manner and whose number in the 1992 elections did not exceed 13% of total Kuwaitis (around 82 thousand out of 630 thousand).

One source observes that the position of each of the government and the parliament regarding the previously mentioned issue reflected a degree of the flexibility required to continue for mutual coexistence and cooperation between them and to limit the fears raised of a possible clash between them, particularly in light of the ministerial amendment made and which achieved distancing some ministers (parliament members) of those originally belonging to the Islamic constitutional movement. This was because they favored their parliamentary group over their adherence to government solidarity .

In May of the same year (1994), 39 parliament members submitted a proposal for amending Article 2 of the constitution to make it state that “Islamic Law is the main source of legislation” rather than “A main source of legislation” as Article 2 states. Yet this attempt by the parliament failed due to the objection of Kuwaiti crown prince Sheikh Jaber Ahmed As-Sabah to it. The government sent a letter to the parliament indicating that the practice of Islamic Law does not require a constitutional amendment and that it is possible to amend existing legislations in accord with the provisions of Islamic Law based on the proposals of a special committee that had been formed by the prince in 1991 (The Higher Committee for Working on the Continuation of Implementing the Provisions of Islamic Law).

It is important to note that with the Kuwaiti’s prince’s rejection of making this constitutional amendment, the 1992 parliament was rendered incapable of discussing the amendment of Article 2 of the constitution during the then existing legislative phase and which ended in 1996. Its inability to discuss this stems from Article 74 of the constitution .

The Islamic Constitutional Movement described the result of not amending the constitution as a violation of advisory and democracy principles and considered constitutional amendment a legal matter rather than a political option. The result was a division in the ranks of Kuwaiti opposition inside the parliament and outside it. This was repeated in another case when the Islamic current attempted to issue a law for founding a university in which sexes are separated and prohibiting the interaction of sexes in Kuwait university whenever that is possible. Though voting was for the draft law in the first reading, it failed in the second .

The representatives of the Islamic People’s Group (As-Salaf) submitted a draft law on founding a religious association. This is the draft law that caused much media and popular outcry since its proposal even before its discussion in the parliament .

The parliament also unanimously approved the draft law on founding free trade areas in Kuwait that characterized by exemption from taxes and customs fees, and the freedom of the entry and exit of goods from the areas’ general subjection to Kuwaiti laws .

It can generally be said that the 1992 parliament competently realized the duties assigned to it by the constitution, particularly in its concern for the ordinary citizen’s issues in numerous important matters related to topics such as residence, education, and population structure.

The 1992 parliament activated its legislative and supervisory tools, specially in the first two years of its legislative term due to the unity and cooperation between the political powers represented in it. This enabled it to issue a number of important laws such as the law of debts (which was amended after that in 1998). The parliament also approved other important laws related to residence and the independence of judicial authorities and examined laws and procedures for early retirement and others .

This is in addition to the parliament’s role in issuing a report on the investigation of truths resulting from the Iraqi invasion and founding a permanent committee for defending public funds and a committee for defending human rights. These are accomplishments that any council would have found difficult to achieve in the circumstances surrounding it .

In December 1995, the parliament approved, in a procedure of the first of its kind in Gulf countries, Kuwait’s joining of the international agreement for combating torture then approved in a later decree in February 1996 its joining the two international declarations of civil and political rights and of economic, social, and cultural rights. In another respect, the parliament decided to cancel the state security court and to instead refer all issues to the criminal court .

5- The 1996-99 Parliament
The 1996 elections led to the acquisition of the Kuwaiti government’s allies of a safe majority. Yet this did not lead to tension-free relations between the parliament and government. Relations between them instead involved much defense and discord. This was reflected on the parliament’s legislative performance whereby no law was approved throughout the council’s first session despite the existence of many laws on the council’s work agenda: The weakness of the parliament’s legislative performance was interpreted by the presence of several factors, among them the illness of crown prince Saad Al-Abdallah and his absence for treatment abroad for a seven-month period, the resignation of the Minister of Health and the unavailability of legal quorum in many meetings, which led to canceling them and impairing the work of many committees due to the failure to attend of members.

The confrontation between the parliament and government continued in the second regular session particularly on the part of Islamic parliament members. The confrontation took a severe turn when the government proposed an amendment to the law of debits. This session witnessed the promulgation of a law that makes subsidiary elections an offense and discussed issues employment and social security issues and founding a special committee for investigating the spread of drugs .

In addition to the above, the parliament on April 1996 approved an amendment of the law of Kuwaiti Judicial Authorities. The amendment organizes assigning, transferring, and holding accountable, or dismissing each of Kuwaiti judges or others. The amendment obliges the Minister of Justice to acquire the approval of the High Judicial Council on appointing the public prosecutor and public prosecution members. The amendment changes the formation of the High Judicial Council and the voting mechanism inside it, and its independent budget. Also amended was the penal code, which punishes government employees who do not respect the provisions of judicial authority .

The year 1998 witnessed numerous confrontations between the parliament and government related to the parliament’s legislative performance. The government had referred back in the beginning of 1998 to the council a draft law obliging TV stations to broadcast the events of weekly parliamentary meetings. The government considered this draft law a violation of Article 50 of the constitution, which does gives neither the executive power nor any parliament member the authority to issue decrees to determine the operation of the government’s administrative bodies.

Some parliament members submitted a proposal for amending the law of publications and publishing in such a way to oblige the Ministry of Information to clarify its opinion regarding the publication requests of new newspapers within a maximum period of 30 days and giving the license applicant the right to resort to submit a grievance to judicial authorities if his application is refused .

The truth is that since the announcement of elections and the beginning of the parliament’s practice of its privileges in the eighth legislative phase, there have been attempts to harmonize viewpoints of the legislative and executive powers. Four ministers were elected to the parliament. Yet the tense atmosphere soon prevailed on the relation between the parliament and government until the matter ended in the resignation of the government on March 16 1998 when 3 new elected ministers entered it. The tension again escalated due to the consequences that accompanied the interrogation submitted by parliament member Abbas Al-Khudary to the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Endowments and Islamic Affairs Ahmed Al-Kulayb. The crown prince notified the prince of the complications facing the course of national operation and the failed cooperation between the parliament and the government due to the arbitrariness of parliamentary practices. The Kuwaiti prince issued a decree (No. 34) of 1999 dismissing the parliament on 4 May 1999 before the completion of its constitutional session in accordance with Article 107 of the constitution. Elections were held on 3 July 1999 to choose the members of parliament in its ninth legislative phase ending in 2003.

6- Assessment of the Parliament’s Legislative Performance for the Year 1996
The topic of assessment of the parliament’s legislative performance in 1996 and of its comparison with that of 1992 was an axis of analyses and commentary that addressed the nature of the parliament-government relationship, the reasons for the tensions between them, and finally the size of this parliament’s achievement, particularly on the legislative level.

For example, Ad-Dustour (Constitution) newspaper indicated in its 7 July 1999 edition the contents of a field study conducted by the Kuwaiti news agency on the existence of a clear gap between the declared programs of election candidates for the 1996 parliament and the accomplishments actually achieved in the same parliament. This gap reflects the parliament’s failure to translate citizens’ hopes and ambitions due to non-cooperation between the executive and legislative authorities.

The study pointed out the comparison made by the parliament’s Research Administration between the 1992 and 1996 parliaments and which revealed that productivity had declined by half in terms of work agenda implementation.

The study revealed that the 1992 parliament’s committees held 1309 meetings during the three sessions, resulting in 1559 reports while the 1996 parliament held only 781 meetings resulting in 111 reports during the three sessions.

The 1992 parliament held 150 meetings while the 1996 parliament held 155 meetings, to which 6 meetings are added but were not held due to the loss of legal quorum, and two that were not held due to the government’s absence. The 1996 parliament left behind it around 23 laws that remain on the work agenda and a proposal, a law on supporting and protecting national currency, a law on regulating privatization programs and processes, a proposal for a law on organizing foreign investment, and a proposal for a law on amending the university law, in addition to the civil university law, and others.

Former parliament member and president of the Committee for Educational, Cultural, and Guidance Affairs, Dr. Abd Al-Mohsen Al-Madaaj, approved the study’s contents on the 1996 parliament’s modest performance and described it as a distressed one particularly in legislative issues.

Former parliament member and president of the Health, Social, and Labor Committee Abbas Al-Khudary, also indicated the weakness of the parliament’s performance, for which all members are responsible, even though he also affirmed the parliament’s contribution in the supervisory role. Regarding the legislative one, he said that the committees accomplished many important draft laws but that the conflict between the different currents led to the non-completion of this achievement. He also discussed the absence of legal quorum in many meetings caused by conflicts between different political currents .

In another respect, newspapers set out to explore the viewpoints of former parliament members of the 1996 parliament on their assessment of the parliament’s experience. For example, Constitution newspaper published on 14 July 1999 the opinion of parliament member Ahmed Ad-Duayj. He said that the 1996 parliament lacked much harmony, understanding, and complementarity in terms of viewpoints, which did not amount except to some efforts not characterized by collectivity or coordination with the executive power. Parliament member Faysal As-Shayeh noted that the government was attempting to cancel the parliament’s role. Some criticized the role played by committees under the 1996 parliament and their low effectiveness despite their importance in legislative work considering they are the brewery and actual site of achieving legislative work. Some criticized the phenomenon of members’ struggle over membership in committees without practicing their role in them .

The issue of the 1996 parliament’s weak legislative performance was raised on more than one occasion. In the seminar organized by LBC (Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation) in cooperation with the media administration of the parliament, participant parliament members criticized the government. One of them described it as the government of non-approval and described the 1996 parliament as the parliament of the strong weak side. He indicated that the council would have fulfilled its duties had it succeeded in solving four issues: employment, nationality, bedouins, and housing. Participants indicated the existence of some 60 draft laws (submitted by the government or by members) that were not discussed and indicated that the 1996 parliament’s role was handling the previous accumulations resulting from the Iraqi invasion in addition to its legislative role. For example, it legislated 5 housing laws, the law of protecting public funds, but the problem resides in implementation. The 1996 parliament’s role was more supervisory than legislative .

7- The 1999 Parliament
If it has been difficult to assess the legislative performance of the current parliament, this is because the experience is still in progress, it may be said that the confrontation between the parliament and government has found expression in some of the stances. The most prominent of these stances, in terms of clarity, relates to the issue of decrees issued in the parliament’s absence. The government had abused Article 71 of the Kuwaiti constitution and issued a large number of decrees that totaled around 60. Among these decrees was the special one on granting Kuwaiti women the right to run for parliamentary elections and to vote. This government stance received wide criticism because these decrees addressed topics that were not urgent, and a number of these decrees had related draft laws within the committees’ and parliament’s hands. The parliament’s oppositional stance to these decrees suggested the possibility of a new clash between it and the government.

Kuwaiti newspapers, with much concern, tracked the details of the decrees issue with all its accompanying circumstances. It reported that the parliament decided in the beginning of August 1999 to refer the decrees, among them the women’s decree, to the specialized parliamentary committees so that they can prepare their reports prior to the November 9 meeting in which the fate of women’s participation in the parliament will be decided, and this is the method explained by the constitution at a future time .

Newspapers noted that parliament members’ behavior towards the decrees reflected their agreement to pass 57 decrees while they disagreed substantively regarding three decrees: the decree of woman’s political right, the decree granting foreigners more expanded investment rights, and a third decree giving security forces the right to raid homes in search of weapons without a judicial permission .