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ONE of America’s leading Republican politicians flew into Bahrain at the weekend to address expat business leaders from across the Gulf States … and was joined by one of Democrat President Barack Obama’s regional experts.
In a remarkable show of unity and commonsense often absent on home soil, the parties’ representatives were united in working to build business links and address concerns.
Congressman Mick Mulvaney (South Carolina), considered by many political pundits as a potential future US president, flew more than 20 hours from his home in the US to attend the Middle East Council of American Chambers of Commerce’s (MECACC) gala dinner at the Movenpick Hotel, alongside Jason Buntin, director of Western Europe and Middle East Affairs from the Obama Administrations’ Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR).
“Trade really is a bi-partisan topic in Washington DC right now. Trade is something that is important to both parties – it is a hot topic,” said Congressman Mulvaney.
He works very closely with Congressman Dave Camp, who is chairman of the all-powerful Ways and Means Committee in the House of Representatives. Chairman Camp is in the process of advancing massive and critical tax legislation that could move the US from a citizenship-based tax system to a territorial-based tax system.
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Congressman Mulvaney is in charge of his Study Committee to ensure that overseas Americans are included in the language of the groundbreaking legislation.
One way of encouraging businesses and workers to expand their operations overseas to open up markets for US goods and services, creating jobs home and abroad, would be to change tax laws to ensure workers avoid having to pay US tax on their overseas earnings, he said.
He had promised this ‘bombshell’ announcement and his commitment to the overseas tax issue caused spontaneous applause from the US expats in attendance.
Mr Buntin, who was involved in setting up the ground-breaking US-Bahrain free trade agreement, says after 18 months of negotiations a trade and investment framework had been agreed between the US and all the Gulf States and a joint committee is now progressing with talks over customs policies, property rights, imports and exports and the aim is to ultimately raise awareness of the opportunities opening up for all parties.
American business leaders and the leadership from each of the local chambers located in nine cities across the Arabian Peninsula converged on Bahrain for the events which included a steering committee meeting and trade and export summit. They were joined by many movers and shakers in the business world at the gala dinner. Those in attendance included Shaikh Mohamed bin Abdulla Al Khalifa, chairman of Arabian Exhibition Management, David Cantrell, general manager of Khalifa A. Algosaibi Trading Company, Scott Nichols, Corporate Security Services at Saudi Aramco and Charles Reith, executive vice president of Solomon Associates, an oil operations global company which recently set up its Middle East base in Seef.
The event was organised by Hall Delano Roosevelt, the newly-elected chairman of MECACC and director of new business development for the Reza Investment Group based in Saudi Arabia.
Mr Roosevelt lives in Bahrain and is the grandson of late US president Franklin Delano Roosevelt, often referred to by his initials FDR, and First Lady Eleanor, and he is also a direct descendant of former president Theodore Roosevelt.
He said: Congressman Mulvaney has been ready to roll up his sleeves, come out to the region, sit down with business leaders, government officials and Americans from the private sector who know the business climate in the Middle East better than almost anyone.
“He will be working hard to compile his findings and boil those findings down into a report for his colleagues in Congress upon his return to Washington, D.C.
“He came to listen and he came to learn, and those are rare traits for a member of Congress. The perspective he brings home could help to shape policy and legislation that could impact American businesses in the region for years to come.
“The voices of American business leaders on the ground, in the GCC, are also being heard by the Administration thanks to the Obama Administration sending Jason Buntin.”
