The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “Verily, God loves if any of you does a job, he does it with perfection”. Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), in this Hadith, addressed this valuable wisdom to all mankind, male or female, old or young. This would include, of course, governor or  ordinary citizen,  more importantly those who work in public service and perform projects that benefit the public and improve the nation’s economy. The Prophet (peace be upon him) through this Hadith directed the speech to all professionals and urged them to strive to achieve excellence, proficiency, and perfection.



With deep regret, when we see what had happened in the past few days in our country, such as flooding, suspension of schools, universities and enterprises and their negative impact on the Kingdom’s economy and vital services due the fragility of the infrastructure, we find out the conclusive evidence that indeed we do not apply this Hadith in our lives, despite of our knowledge and understanding of its meaning.



When we see billions of riyals are being spent every year on major infrastructure projects with the objective to improve the economy and the welfare of its citizens and see this sad landscape, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When we find ourselves talking for so many years about transforming our economy from being petroleum-based to more balanced mixed economy, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When we see major infrastructure projects lacking high quality specifications, standards, professional supervision and strict accountability, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When our major infrastructure facilities lack the culture of periodic maintenance and the principle of prevention, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When we find the lack of pro-activeness and foresight before things happen in our major systems, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When we find ourselves not taking advantage of the lessons learned from developed countries and their successful experiences, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When we find ourselves not taking advantage of our past experiences and keep repeating our mistakes year after year, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



When we deal with our beloved country through the principle of what it offers to us, rather than what we have to offer to it, we wonder where we are from this great Hadith!



I conclude this article by saying: We are all responsible and accountable for what had happened. Our society consists of you and me. Let’s think of God in everything we do and let’s start from today implementing this great Hadith in our lives. This is our country, if we do not care, who should?  If we do not fix its problems, who will? This is our beautiful religion and this is what was instructed to us by our great Prophet (peace be upon him). Our religion instructs us to be the best in all aspect of life, in economy, education, medical, social, and scientific fields, infrastructure, welfare, etc...



— Dr. Sami Alnuaim is a Saudi writer. He can be reached at www.saudienergy.net and followed on  Twitter@neaimsa