Saudi Arabia and the Guinness Book of World Records

The Saudi Crown Prince has been using money from Saudi Arabia’s Sovereign Investment Fund to go on a buying spree to put his country on the map in as many favorable ways as possible. He wants people to forget the murder and dismemberment of the dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi bombing of civilians in Yemen, the Saudi imprisonment, and even executions, of religious and political rivals. He’s been spending large sums on “sportswashing” by buying up players and teams from Europe and America. The Saudis first began by buying up American golf champions, such as Phil Mickelson, offering them each tens or in some cases even hundreds of millions of dollars to sign up with the new, Saudi-owned LIV Golf League. The Saudis then agreed to invest $1 billion into the PGA, in effect giving it control of both of the two main leagues. In soccer, the Saudis have bought a majority stake in Newcastle United for 300 million euros, and are set to buy Roma AS for close to 400 million. The Saudi investment bank SAIB has entered into a deal with Real Madrid to be the club’’s official sponsor. The Saudis signed the champion soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo for their Al-Nassr club; Ronaldo is paid 177 million euros a year, with another 88 million euros given as a bonus at signing. Another soccer superstar, Lionel Messi, turned down an offer to join the Saudi club Al-Hilal that would have given him €1.5 billion for 3 years, 500 million euros per season. Messi chose instead to play for Inter Miami. But he has been given a contract by the Saudi Tourism Authority worth 22.5 million euros for almost no work except to serve as a promoter of Saudi Arabia as a tourist destination, as part of a campaign to dismantle “walls” of “misconception” and break “outdated stereotypes” about Saudi Arabia. It’s called “Go Beyond What You Think.” In May 2023, Messi travelled to Diriyah in Saudi Arabia and shared photos online of his trip. That was enough to fulfill his contractual obligations that year.

The Saudis are also trying to buy their way into the record books — not the sports records, for there they win only in the category of highest salaries paid to foreign sports stars — but into the Guinness Book of World Records. They have been spending large sums on getting new categories of competition recognized by Guinness, and then claiming to be the world leader in those categories. More on Saudi Arabia’s paying Guinness for listing the Kingdom’s truly bizarre accomplishments can be found here: “Saudi Arabia pays Guinness World Records in ‘new whitewashing’ ruse – and is awarded records for stunningly boring achievements including ‘largest multi-effect distillation desalination unit’ and ‘largest dental hospital,’” by Gina Kalsi, Daily Mail, February 24, 2024:

Saudi Arabia pays Guinness World Records in ‘new whitewashing’ ruse – and is awarded records for stunningly boring achievements including ‘largest multi-effect distillation desalination unit’ and ‘largest dental hospital’

This week, GWR announced ten new awards for the country, a decision which has come under fire by human rights groups.

Ever since the murder and dismemberment of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents, the Kingdom has been trying to burnish its image; that’s what the “sportswashing” is all about. The Saudis continue to get a bad press for the long prison sentences they give to political dissidents, their bombing of Yemeni civilians during that country’s civil war, and the executions by decapitation not just of criminals, but also of Shi’a leaders including Nimr Baqir al-Nimra, a Shia cleric and critic of the government in Saudi Arabia, who was beheaded on January 2, 2016.

While records are usually interesting and unique, such as the longest beard on a living female and most consecutive visits to Disneyland, Saudi Arabia’s achievement are dull in comparison.

Their wins included ‘largest covered water reservoir for storing drinking water’, ‘largest multi-effect distillation desalination unit’ and ‘largest dental hospital’..

Saudi Arabia is seen as a ‘repressive’ state by human rights movements and the UN has recently expressed concern at the imminent execution of Abdullah Al-Derazi, who was a child at the time of his alleged offences.

Analysis by the Times found that the Middle Eastern country had quickly upped its amount of records in comparison to five years ago.

Before 2019, it was given 54 awards, but this number flew to 160 after this period. Last year alone, it managed it set 56 niche records, such as ‘Largest intellectual property lesson’.

Human rights organisations claimed GWR was helping the country conceal its reputation….

James Lynch, a co-director of the human rights group FairSquare and a former British diplomat based in Qatar, said that GWR should announce which of its records were linked to payments.

He also told the newspaper: ‘Guinness is very much supporting Mohammed bin Salman’s economic and investment drive and when you’re supporting that, you’re also supporting his wider programme of repression.’…

Guinness World Records told MailOnline: ‘We genuinely believe that record-breaking should be for everyone; whoever you are, whatever your background, wherever you’re from in the world and we will always embrace the chance to introduce GWR to new audiences everywhere. …

‘GWR is a business, and like so many western businesses, brands, sports events and so on, as Saudi society has begun to open up, we have seen interest in what we do rise sharply….

Oh, GWR is a business, all right, and suddenly a major part of its business is listing Saudi achievements in bizarre categories, in exchange for the usual Saudi expression of bankable gratitude.

Forget about Guinness attempting to defend itself from the charges that it has been paid by the Saudis to list new, bizarre categories where Riyadh claims to hold the world records. Take a look at some of the Guinness World Records recently listed that are held by Saudi Arabia, which must make the Kingdom very proud:

Guinness World Records wins for Riyadh

•      Largest house cleaning lesson: 2,030
•      Largest gathering of people with type 1 diabetes: 752
•      Largest reverse osmosis water desalination plant: 600,000 cubic metres
•      Largest paint store: 1,682 sq metres
•      Lowest twinning rate: 4.9 twins per 1,000 deliveries
•      Most text messages received in one hour: 19,469
•      Most supplements inserted into broadsheet newspapers in one minute: Ten
•      Largest intellectual property lesson: 758
•      Largest multi-effect distillation water desalination plant: 3 million cubic metres
•      Smallest floating golf green: 1 sq metre

I’m impressed. Aren’t you? What country wouldn’t be proud to possess the world’s “largest paint store”? Or to have held the “largest gathering of people with type-1 diabetes”? Or have hosted the “largest house cleaning lesson”? Or have made the “smallest floating golf green,” on which everyone is guaranteed to get a hole in one? And there is my favorite — “most text messages received in an hour.” An extraordinary 19,469! These are all spectacular achievements that were finally recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records after the appropriate payment — some might call it baksheesh — was forthcoming from the Saudis. The Crown Prince should be very proud.

And there are other categories of achievements, where the Saudis hold the record, but that are as yet unrecognized by the Guinness World Records. Here are a few:

Largest little-ducky children’s bath toy: approximately 10’ x 7’x 3.5’, weighing one ton

Largest number of copies of Mein Kampf in Arabic: 8,539,247

Most rewinds of Paris Hilton sex tape in a single afternoon: 734

Largest number of former college students in America who had to flee the U.S. rather than face charges of 1) vehicular homicide: 3209 and 2) rape: 671

Longest roll of duct tape in the world: 8670 miles.

Largest number of weight-reducing clinics: 65,216

Greatest number of plagiarized passages in a senior official’s doctoral dissertation: 7,489

Largest birthday piñata: three-ton “El Gordo” with 3,455 separate toys and candies inside

Greatest number of chess pieces: 26,789,213

Smallest number of chess players: 129

Smallest number of public libraries: 3

Largest number of grains of sand on a single beach: 458,992,674,304,827,904,097

Go to it, Crown Prince. The world needs to know that Saudi Arabia is about far more than those millions of pilgrims who, in making the Hajj, climb Mount Arafat, journey to Mina to throw seven pebbles apiece at three columns, and best of all, get to walk seven times widdershins round the Magic Wonderstone. Just above I’ve listed other categories in which your country has excelled, that demonstrate that the Kingdom is not just about oil and the Two Holy Mosques, but is in truth a many-splendored thing. Make the Guinness people an offer they can’t refuse, so that these achievements, too, can be properly recognized. Shall we say something nominal, like 75 million euros?