The ongoing protests on the third consecutive day brought the business virtually at grinding halt in the banking and financial capital of the Middle East.
The main shopping malls including City Centre, Seef Mall and Al A’ali Mall, Marina Mall, Yateem Centre in Manama, Hotels and restaurants businesses were the hard hit during the last three days.
This is in addition to the hundreds of thousands daily wage workers who lost the chance to earn a bread and butter for their families.
The Chairman of the Bahrain Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI) Dr Esam Fakhro, among other business community leaders, raised his concerns over the unfolding events over the past couple of days and said it would bear numerous economic ramifications.
The business community vowed that ongoing protests should be stopped which could have a major impact on the country’s economy.
In the wake of the three-days anti-government demonstrations in the capital city of Manama took a heavy toll on the businesses as Bahrain Bourse edged 0.2 per cent on Wednesday with reporting only nine shares were traded. Qatar and Kuwait’s stock exchanges slipped 1.8% and 1.4% respectively.
Warning about the possible economic ramifications of protests, Dr Fakhro said, it would cripple economic and trade activities and would also cause a dent to the Kingdom’s stature as business and financial centre in the Middle East.
Other members at the BCCI board and many businessmen, who didn’t wish to be identified by name, joined Dr Fakhro and condemned the violation and escalation over past couple of days.
Dr Fakhro rejected any move aimed at hindering the Government’s efforts in creating a sustainable economy for the country.
Dr Fakhro called upon everyone to rally together behind His Majesty King Hamad, Prime Minister Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa and Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Crown Prince and Deputy Supreme Commander, for a better future.
“We have hundreds of visitors every day from across the Saudi causeway and this figure goes as high to 1500 families’ weekly visiting Bahrain. What message we are giving to the outside world through these ugly scenes of skirmishes,” a leading business said.
“Bahrain is aiming itself to become hub for family tourism and such incidents will just not help the system to run,” he added.
“The ongoing protests have denied the basic rights of earning to hundreds of vendors and poor labourers who work at the Central Market. The blockade of Pearl Roundabout has virtually put everything at halt and how we can compensate those small businesses, traders and vendors,” another leading retail trader said.
Referring to Bahrain’s stature as one of the most dynamic and open economies by Heritage Foundation, a banker said that we have to make a point that such ugly events should not ever take place again.
According to the annual Index of Economic Freedom published by the Heritage Foundation and Wall Street Journal, Bahrain was named among the world’s top 10 most economically free nations.
In the Index the Kingdom was ranked 10th of 183 economies worldwide, up three places from last year to one behind the United States and six ahead of the United Kingdom in the influential rankings.
Bahrain remains the most free of 17 nations in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region and the only in MENA to have featured in the world’s top 20 since the launch of the Index in 1995.