Date: 9 February 2005
Title: His Majesty King Abdullah II letter to H.E. the Prime Minister Mr. Faisal El-Fayez

In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful

His Excellency Brother Faisal Al-Fayez,
Our Esteemed Prime Minister,

May God bless and protect him Peace and God's mercy and blessings be upon you.

It gives me pleasure to extend to you and your colleagues the Ministers my appreciation of your work and relentless efforts, in your continued endeavors to realize comprehensive development and complete the build up of modern Jordan; a modern Jordan that is progressive and advanced, that fulfills the ambitions of its sons and daughters and their aspirations to a free decent life and bright future that is worthy of their strong will, sacrifices and solid belonging to this beloved country.

Since we decided firmly on reconsidering the formation of the administrative units in the Kingdom to expand the base of popular participation in decision making, arranging priorities and implementing plans and programmes related to our developmental march, we should emphasize that our aspiration to comprehensive development whose positive outcomes are reflected on the standard of living in society, and which provides means for decent living to every citizen, male or female, in this country, depends basically on how successful we are in facing economic and social challenges at this stage which witnesses several changes around us.

To realize our vision of a modern Jordan that fulfils the aspirations of Jordanian citizens in realizing progress and prosperity, all efforts should be unified and integrated in the private and public sectors, the Parliament, civil society organizations and the media, to draft a national agenda that embodies the vision of all of us and specifies strategic programmes and national policies whose realization should be binding to successive governments.

Formulating and identifying these national goals should be completed through activities and thorough discussions that take into consideration the participation of all Jordanians within governmental and non-governmental agencies, and the identification of the roles and responsibilities of all in the march for development and building, since these goals ore going to identify the several aspects of our march over the next ten years.

It is imperative here to emphasize that attaining the goals we aspire to is not restricted to quality and competency in formulating them, or precision and brilliance in defining them; more important than these is the ability for implementation, attaining the expected results on the ground and establishing the principles and standards by which we measure success in realizing these goals or failure thereof. Naturally, this calls for the existence of a competent government apparatus that believes in team work targeted towards achieving goals and expected results, and that is based on the principles of competence, worthiness and accountability; this apparatus in turn will be the moving force for the different bodies working on translating national goals into tangible reality on the ground.

We believe that achieving progress cannot be effected through distancing ourselves from past experiences; rather, we should learn from past experiences, since the challenge we face is embodied in our capability to make use of accumulated experiences and the flexibility in responding to different changes, on condition that the measure of real progress in envisaged by the degree of progress, prosperity and tangible improvement in the citizens' standard of living.

To advance this procedure, we will form a commission that would embody wide categories of society, including representatives of Government, Parliament, civil society organizations, the private sector and the media; the commission will work on coordinating efforts, drafting the national agenda as a whole, approving its basic sub-topics, forming committees to list priorities for different sectors in all political, economic and social fields and supervising the work of these committees making sure that national priorities are harmonized in the context of available resources; all these efforts should be completed by September 2005.

While we look forward to building a strong society built on the principles of integrity and esteemed values emphasized by our tolerant Shari'a (Islamic Law) and our authentic Arab heritage, and to enhancing innovative work based on professionalism, competency and accountability, we aspire at the same time to formulating a national agenda that realizes the dreams of our youth and guarantees the future of our children, enabling them to develop their capabilities and utilize their potential in the service of their country and achieving decent living for every Jordanian, male or female.

I pray to God Almighty to protect you and grant us success in the service of our country and nation.

Peace and God's mercy and blessings be upon you,,

Abdullah II ibn al-Hussein
Amman,
9 February 2005