Dear Mr President Trump,
Congratulations on your stunning historical win.
No one argues with success, but in all frankness, I did not expect you to win and in all honesty, I did not want you to win either. Also, very frankly, I am not very happy that you have been elected as the 45th President of the United States. It is disappointing and disheartening to me and to millions around the world.
Yet, as depressed as I deeply feel at the shocking outcome of your election, I have to respect the choice of the American people. They voted for the unexpected candidate in one of the longest, toughest and most amazing presidential elections in recent American history. I think they will regret this choice four years down the road. However, millions of unhappy Americans and many million astonished people around the world have to live with this nightmare. They will have to wear winter clothing and dig in, expecting the worst for the next four winters.
Mr President,
I have always maintained that the last thing the world needs right now is a US president who brings in a huge dose of uncertainty into global politics that is already full of uncertainties and lacks stability. ‘Anybody-but-Trump’ has been consistently my line of thinking from day one and until the last minute into this amazing election.
The world needs a confident trust-worthy statesman, not a bombastic businessman who lives on a reality TV show. I for one do not see the credible statement in you. Please prove me wrong. The last thing the world needs right now is a US president who lacks leadership quality and adds more confusion to the mighty confused global politics.
Mr President,
The American people have just elected the most unqualified presidential candidate in US history. No one prior to you held the infamous title of the least qualified candidate for the most important political job in the world before you. Your opponent Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, was probably the most qualified presidential candidate in recent memory. Candidate Clinton was certainly more qualified for the job than these previous six presidential candidates:Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, Barack Obama and indeed Clinton’s husband Bill.
How is it that the democratic system in America ends up with the least qualified candidate and turns its back on the most qualified candidate? How is it that some 80 million Americans voted for a certified racist candidate? What kind of America is the America of 2016? Whatever happened to the open, tolerant friendly people of America? Is this their gift to the rest of the world, who believe in America as the land of tolerance? Talk about a rigged system. Maybe you are absolutely right — it is, afterall, a rigged, corrupt and dysfunctional system that sends not only the least credible candidate, but a despicable and deplorable person to the white house.
Mr President,
I am a concerned citizen of the world, but I am also more concerned as a citizen of the Arab Gulf states and the UAE, one of the closest and most trusted partners of the US in the Middle East. I have heard you during your campaign, talking about the Arab Gulf states as though they are nothing but oil-rich countries that need to pay America for its military presence in the region. There is more to the Gulf states than money and oil. If that is how you view us, then we are in for a bad start. This talk about forcing Arab Gulf states to pay for American protection has added more fuel to the mounting anti-Saudi Arabia manifestations running wild in Washington these days.
The US-Gulf Cooperation Council relationship has gone through a tough eight years of President Barack Obama. With this kind of nonsense, I see a difficult four years of the relationship between Washington and Arab Gulf capitals under your presidency.
However, the Arab Gulf capitals will be watching closely to see if you deliver on your campaign promise to turn up the Iran nuclear deal on Day One in office. This, among other things, will be the ultimate test of your credibility in this part of the world.
Mr President,
I do not want to take back my congratulations to you, but no matter how I look at it, I frankly see your victory as a political disaster for America and the world at large. I cannot help feeling utterly saddened that the mighty and great country of the USA now has an angry, white American as its 45th president.
Dr Abdulkhaleq Abdulla is professor of Political Science, chairman of the Arab Council for Social Sciences, theacss.org and a visiting senior fellow at the London School of Economics. You can follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/Abdulkhaleq_UAE.
