A Southern Municipal councillor may face disciplinary proceedings after walking out of a council session in protest to a row over meeting arrangements, in which the opposition accused government ministers of stalling the meeting.
Mohammed Daraj, chairman of the council’s financial, administrative and legislative committee, walked out of the session on Wednesday, accusing a senior official at the Municipalities Affairs and Agriculture Ministry of deliberately obstructing proceedings by failing to secure attendance from representatives of the Electricity and Water Affairs and Housing and Urban Planning ministries, who were required for items on the agenda.
Council chairman Abdulla Abdullatif rejected the accusation outright, telling the GDN that Daraj had tried to prevent other councillors from entering the chamber before the meeting started, causing a delay to its 10am start.
According to Abdullatif, Daraj later sat silently through the opening agenda items before abruptly standing, directing insults at the senior official, and walking out — even gesturing for colleagues to follow him, which they declined to do. Abdullatif said the incident undermined his authority as chairman and warned that “severe punishment” was being considered.
Under Bahrain’s municipal regulations, a council member can be stripped of membership for breaching their duties, though any such move requires a two-thirds vote and gives the member a chance to respond first.
Daraj defended his walkout as a response to genuine service delays rather than a staged protest, saying he had written twice to ministry expropriation and municipal affairs official Sadiq Al Sitri requesting officials attend, only to be told each time that insufficient notice had been given.
Al Sitri, for his part, said the ministry’s standard seven-working-day notice period exists to give government bodies adequate time to prepare, not to restrict how often councils meet, and that his office works to reschedule sessions when needed.
He said proper coordination with ministries was necessary before councils could act on recommendations requiring government follow-through.
The dispute is the latest in a string of tensions involving Daraj, who two years ago sought unsuccessfully to resign from his committee post without explanation, a request colleagues unanimously rejected.
