Year 1960 - Part 10: The Founding of the Unified Arabic Language Academy

Sunday, 26 June: The Founding of a Unified Arabic Language Academy

Republican Decision No. 1144, dated 12 May 1960 (published in the Official Gazette in its issue dated 26 June), was issued, providing for the merger of the two academies into a single academy.

Egypt had its own Arabic Language Academy, and Syria had its own "Arab Scientific Academy."

The Syrian academy had been established "by decree" No. 5698/2347, dated 8 June 1919, to care for the Arabic language and promote it, in the days of the very first Arab government established in Damascus, following the Arab lands' separation from the Ottoman Sultanate.

Faisal bin al-Hussein was, at the time, the king the country had accepted and rallied around.

The academy was established through the personal effort of its first president, the late Muhammad Kurd Ali, and thirteen members were appointed alongside him in the academy's first year, among them the brilliant statesman and my own professor at the Institute of Law, Faris al-Khouri.

Mr. Muhammad Kurd Ali remained the academy's president until God took him unto Himself on 2 April 1953.

When the union between Egypt and Syria came about, it was decided to establish a single, unified academy, bringing together the academies of Egypt and Syria, and the republican instrument was issued in 1960, with the members of both academies automatically becoming members of the unified academy.

After the secession took place, the Syrian academy separated once more, retaining the name:

"The Arabic Language Academy."

The academy today is made up of 20 full members, elected by their own colleagues by secret ballot, with a republican decree issued confirming the election and appointing the full member.

This number is fixed, and may not be increased.

The academy also has corresponding members, elected by the full members in a secret ballot, their appointment confirmed by a decision of the Minister of Higher Education.

These may be Syrians, or Arab or foreign scholars, with an interest in Arab culture. Among the corresponding members are Syrians, other Arabs, Frenchmen, Russians, Spaniards, and Italians.

This lofty institution honored me by electing me a full member, to the seat left vacant by the death of the late Dr. Shukri Faisal, at the academy's own session held on 24 November 1990.

The republican decree confirming my appointment as a member was issued as No. 205, dated 14 May 1991, and I was given the traditional induction reception at the Zahiriyah Library in Damascus on 16 October 1991.

I was welcomed by the academy's president, Dr. Shaker al-Fahham.

And I was "received" with a gracious address by Dr. Ihsan al-Nass.

I gave a lengthy address, in which I thanked those who had elected me, and studied the literary legacy of my predecessor, Shukri Faisal.

With this, I gained the right to take part in the academy's own sessions and those of its committees, and my own rank became the sixtieth in the "register of the immortals," though immortality belongs to God alone. I would have had the right to a rank of thirty-sixth, had I accepted it earlier.

For Prince Mustafa al-Shihabi, the academy's president, along with its vice president, the famous poet Khalil Mardam Bey, and its secretary, Prince Jaafar al-Hasani al-Jazairi, had visited me at my office at the Ministry of Education back in 1951, offering to elect me a full member. I did not think it proper for such an election to take place while I still held a ministerial post, and asked them to wait until our own cabinet, headed by the late Hasan al-Hakim, resigned. But Shishakli overthrew it and had us arrested, and the idea of my own membership fell dormant.

To give some idea of the academy's own mission, I quote here a few passages from Article 2 of the decision establishing it.

The Academy's Objectives

Preserving the integrity of the Arabic language, and ensuring it meets the demands of the sciences and arts as they advance, keeping it suited to the needs of life in the present age.

Unifying terminology within the Arabic language.

Arabic studies, and reviving the Arab heritage in the sciences, arts, and letters, and its own connection to Arab history, monuments, and civilization, and this civilization's own relationship to, influence upon, and influence from, other civilizations.

Studying everything relevant to the advancement of the Arabic language, along with whatever studies and projects are entrusted to the academy for study.

The academy publishes a journal every three months, in which it publishes the writings of its own members and non-members alike.

The academy has been a member of the Union of Arabic Language Academies since the issuing of Legislative Decree No. 88, dated 2 October 1971.

Thursday, 30 June: To Cairo

We spent the evening with some friends, and did not retire to bed until around one in the morning. We had scarcely closed our eyes when the doorbell rang.

It was a relative of ours, arriving from Russia, where she had been studying at Moscow University.

No sooner had an hour, or part of an hour, passed than the telephone rang.

An urgent cable from El-Kaissouni (the central minister), asking me to be present in the morning for a meeting to be held with Field Marshal Abdel Hakim Amer at his own office in Cairo.

I boarded a plane at half past ten in the morning, and made my way to the Ministry of the Treasury, where El-Kaissouni was waiting for me.

We discussed a number of matters set aside for fuller study, regarding the general budget and the development budget.

Both budgets were now ready to be presented to the President, to obtain his own approval for issuing them by decision.

I truly do not know whether Dr. Abdel Moneim El-Kaissouni, one of old Egypt's own pashas, had simply lost his way into socialism, or whether he was, at heart, "a man of the people" ridden by the demon of vanity.

He once wished to give a lecture in Alexandria, and, in my own presence, summoned his office director and instructed him to travel to the northern port city and study the state of the hall, where he himself would sit before mounting the podium's own steps, where the photographers would stand to capture his own picture and record his lecture, which hotel he would stay at, and which direction his own room should face to overlook the sea, and what kind of food should be served him. He instructed him to bring along a group of staff as well, to be present to receive him and oversee the arrangement of the event.

A man of such elaborate arrangements, one hardly wonders, would think nothing of leaving journalists waiting for us for nearly four hours, after we had told them we would hold a "press conference" on the financial situation.

When we finally arrived, he shook not a single one of their hands, but handed out his own sweet smiles to them instead.

This is a state of affairs entirely unfamiliar to us, one we have never known in the "Northern Region."

Sunday the 3rd: Approving the Two Budgets

The President signed both budgets, ordinary and development, exactly as we had presented them to him. As for the ordinary budget for 1960/1961, I note the following:

Its revenue estimates came to 512,225,000 Syrian lira.

We reduced the livestock-count tax by 9 million lira, bringing it down to 3 million lira from last year's estimate of 12 million. The reason for this reduction was the death of enormous numbers of livestock, from hunger and thirst, under the grip of the relentless drought.

We reduced customs revenue by 13 million, having lowered duties on all consumer food items, to keep their prices affordable for the poorer classes.

We kept the estimate for tobacco revenue at the same level as previous years, 32 million lira.

The reason for this is that habitual smokers will not cut back their own consumption, and some people, regrettably, prefer their cigarettes even over life's own necessities.

We reduced revenue from military-exemption fees from 12 million last year to just 1 million.

The purpose of this reduction was to bring about equality between the wealthy, able to pay this fee to keep their own sons out of the armed forces and their own military service, and the poor, who cannot afford this exemption fee to "spare" their own sons this duty, one the constitution itself calls "sacred."

What I would add is that the deficit was a large one, and it was not desirable to impose new taxes. For this reason, the President decided to "grant" the Northern Region, from the Southern Region's own budget, an assistance of 22,225,000 lira.

As for the development budget for the same year, its figures came to:

254,000,000 Syrian lira.

The most notable items it was spent on were as follows:

Industrial projects: 33 million

Transport and communications: 63 million

Irrigation and land reclamation projects: 65 million

Education: 20 million

Health projects: 6 million

Agricultural projects: 16 million

Social affairs: 5 million

Public utilities and tourism: 16 million

Municipal projects: 18 million

Among the projects on which we placed enormous hopes:

Petroleum projects, allotted 25,650,000 lira

Railways: 40,000,000 lira

Irrigation and electricity: 79,000,000 lira

What I want to record, for those who spread the rumor, night and day, that Egypt was "plundering" the Northern Region, is that this development budget was itself "granted" by Abdel Nasser, in the amount of 30 million lira, under the name "the Southern Region's own contribution."

With this, the Southern Region's own aid to its "brother," the Northern Region, came to 30 plus 22.225 million, a total of 52,225,000 lira.

It remained for us to seek foreign credit facilities for the development budget's remaining projects, estimated at 94 million lira. The nearest pocket for us to reach into was that of the Eastern bloc states, since the Western bloc was never satisfied with this Union to begin with.

Sunday, 3 July

After the President signed the ordinary and development budgets, he told me he wished to meet with me at 8:30 that evening, at his own home in Manshiyet al-Bakri, that truly modest house he had lived in since his days as an army officer, bought with a loan from the officers' own private fund and savings set aside from his salary over many long years.

He was standing in the house's own garden waiting for me, his usual sweet, smiling expression on his face.

Our conversation ranged widely over two full hours. Every time he lit a cigarette for himself, he lit one for me as well.

I began by thanking him for what he had granted from the Southern Region's own bread, bread our own region, tested by God with years of drought, genuinely needed. He answered, modestly, that this was simply a brother's own duty toward his brother, since the two regions had become a single state, and it would not be right for one to live in "luxury" while the other remained "in need." He added: praise God, the Southern Region has a surplus this year of seventy million pounds, which we have carried over into the development budget, to make up for the years of deficit.

What follows is a faithful summary of our conversation:

1. The American Loan

He said: we borrowed 36.50 million pounds from America, the price of quantities of its own surplus wheat held in storage, on the understanding that we would repay its price in local currency (Egyptian and Syrian), for the American embassy to spend on its own local needs.

You yourself will sign the agreement, for the part concerning the Northern Region. But we will not actually pay any sum or goods at all toward repaying this loan. And indeed, we consumed the wheat, and I never signed the contract, nor did the American embassy ever press me for it. So we never paid for these goods at all. Indeed, certain private American charitable institutions "donated" to us large quantities of powdered milk, dried egg, and butter, the crates carrying them stamped with the words: A gift from the friendly American people to the friendly people of the United Arab Republic.

When I returned and put the matter before the Syrian Council of Ministers, Abdul Hamid al-Sarraj demanded this phrase be removed from the crates, so that it would not serve as propaganda for America. But I refused, fearing, first, that the shipments might simply stop, and, second, that removing it would amount to ingratitude. Either we accept the gift, or we do not.

I insisted that the council formally authorize me to sign the agreement in question, one I never actually signed, as a precaution for the future, fearing it might later be said that I had acted unilaterally on my own personal responsibility, or that some might deny any knowledge of it, or simply forget about it. The council granted my request, and decided to accept the aid, which arrived at the very best possible time.

2. The Syrian Political Prisoners

I raised the matter of these convicted men, Syrian ministers and deputies sentenced by Afif al-Bizri's own court on the charge of working with Iraqi intelligence to overthrow the government of Syria before the Union came about, the affair known as the "Iraqi Plot." The verdict against them, issued at the end of the trial, was death, handed down on 27 February 1957.

The death sentence was never carried out against any of them, owing to President Abdel Nasser's own personal intervention, and it was decided to commute these sentences to hard labor for life.[1]

Among these convicted men were Dr. Adnan al-Atassi, son of former President Hashim al-Atassi, a man whose own struggle we hold in the highest regard, Dr. Sami Kabbara, Deputy Adel al-Ajlani, Deputy Sobhi al-Umari, and several officers.

The President asked me my own impressions of this trial, and I answered him, with all the honesty and scholarly duty of a professor, that it had not been a fair trial at all, since it allowed lawyers to represent a private plaintiff, when no private plaintiff actually existed to begin with, and even had one existed, the law forbids such representation before an exceptional court. Likewise, the accused were denied their own right to defend themselves. I myself declined to defend Hayel al-Souror (deputy for the Masaeed tribe), because a chorus of intelligence-service hecklers stood at the courthouse door, hurling abuse at any lawyer "reckless" enough to agree to defend one of the accused.

The presiding judge, Afif al-Bizri, insulted Mr. Ahmad Qanbar, brought in as a witness, simply for glancing at his own watch after growing tired of standing so long on his feet while answering the judges' and prosecution's own questioning.

I added that, even so, the joy of their release would touch their own families' hearts, and heal what had been broken in them.

The President said he had agreed with Abdel Hakim and Abdul Hamid al-Sarraj to release them after the Union's own anniversary celebrations (23 July), transferring them to Cairo, where their release would be announced "for health reasons."

I thanked him for this humane gesture.

3. Relations with Iraq

I asked the President: is there any improvement in our relations with Abdul Karim Qasim? He said: none at all. Iraq has fallen under communist rule, and Qasim has become a mere front for this doctrine and for his own communist associates. He believes the Iraqi people are simply waiting for relief to come from some quarter or other. He showed me an issue of a newspaper speaking in Qasim's own name in Iraq, containing an article signed by its writer under the pen name "Dhu al-Nun," describing the communists as mere "agents." We were both struck with astonishment that such a sentence had ever gotten past so merciless a censor. The President went on: believe me, had the Union not come about, Syria would have been exposed to the horrors and atrocities of the communists. These very events in Iraq bear witness to their own bloodthirstiness.

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Endnotes:

[1] See the details of this plot in our own book "Rushdi al-Kikhya," p. 342 of the manuscript.