Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, Second Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister, said that there are forthcoming programs that will be launched under the umbrella of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030. In a press conference held today after the launch of the "Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030," the Deputy Crown Prince said that the first of these programs is the national transformation program, expected to be announced by the end of the 5th month or the beginning of the 6th month, indicating that it would be an executive program to achieve the objectives of the vision in many sectors the most important of which are the sector of services and needs of citizens and it will have more and clear details when launched. Here's the press conference of the Deputy Crown Prince: Q: We are beginning to see a new Saudi Arabia, and see its features today, where the contribution of the private sector is 40%, according to what is now part of the privatization project. There is a strong privatization that will focus on education and health but there are experiments we have found in other countries where the privatization projects benefit the richer by virtue of financial capacity. How do we make sure that the results of this privatization will not make rich more richer and the poor poorer? A: We have an experience in STC when it was privatized; its shares were offered for public subscription. Those who subscribed were the citizens and not the businessmen. In the health sector, the idea now is to turn the holding hospitals owned by the Ministry of Health into a holding company and then be offered for public subscription. In this way, they will be offered to citizens directly and those who buy the shares will be the citizens. This will mostly prevent businessman and the wealthy from taking advantage of the privatization process as it will have high transparency and through direct subscription by citizens. Q: The vision is carried out through two tracks: a clearer economic track and the social track; the question is about the social track: how will it materialize for citizens and how will they feel it in a short period of time; is there a timetable, whether in health, education and housing or certain stages to be clearer? A: Forthcoming programs will be announced and launched under the umbrella of the "Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030," the first of which is the national transformation program expected to be announced by the end of the 5th month or the beginning of the 6th month. It will be an executive program to achieve the objectives of the vision in many sectors the most important of which is the sector of services and the needs of the citizens. They will have more details and clearer when launched. Asked about Aramco, he said, "Firstly, we are talking about more than a trillion dollars and until now, valuation of Aramco has not finished. We are working on this thing with the banks and specialized centers. We expect that the evaluation of Aramco will be more than two trillion dollars." He added that there are non-Aramco assets that will enter the fund and part of them will be also income for the fund with a value that may reach $ 300 billion in addition to the current value of the fund which is nearly $ 200 billion. In this way, we will have a public investment fund with the size of more than a trillion, nearly $ 3 trillion. Freezing the production of Aramco has nothing to do with its value or entry to the fund and the decision is for the benefit of Aramco. Already, competent authorities in the kingdom have announced that the kingdom would welcome any process to freeze production if shared among all the major states in OPEC, but so far the other states did not take the initiative and did not commit to freezing their production. --More
