DUBAI/SHANGHAI, (Reuters) – Formula One organisers are to make a final decision within days on whether to go ahead with the Bahrain Grand Prix as they consider whether anti-government protests, which prevented last year’s running of the premier motor race, will flare up again.
Daily street clashes, a jailed activist on hunger strike and opposition calls to cancel the event have raised uncertainty over the long-planned race, while organisers and the Bahraini government appear set on going forward and keeping things calm.
A big test will be whether street clashes after Friday prayers will spook the Formula One’s governing body and commercial chief Bernie Ecclestone, who are expected to decide over the weekend. Bahrain’s government, which could also call off the race, has given no signs of doing so.
Ecclestone hinted that the matter was all but settled.
“The race is on the calendar, it’s scheduled. The only people that can do anything about it is the national sporting authority in the country that can ask for it to be withdrawn from the calendar,” he told Reuters at the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai. “Unless it gets withdrawn by the national sporting authority in the country, then we’ll be there.”
At stake is not just a race that in 2010, when it was last held, brought in more than 100,000 visitors and half a billion dollars in spending to Bahrain, but the country’s pride in being the first in the Middle East to host Formula One in 2004.
Bahrain’s Sunni Muslim rulers are eager to bring back a successful race as part of their efforts to show progress on reconciliation and reform with a majority Shi’ite community that led anti-government protests last year.
Crown Prince Sheikh Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa initiated the race in Bahrain and is also its honorary president.
Last year’s race was delayed, then ultimately cancelled, just after the peak of the February-March revolt by mostly Shi’ite pro-democracy demonstrators demanding a greater say in government and better access to jobs and housing. Bahrain’s monarchy quashed the revolt with the help of security forces from Saudi Arabia, and more then 30 people died. A final decision on whether to go forward is due this weekend at the Chinese Grand Prix. The Bahrain leg of the Formula One circuit is to follow on April 20-22.
“Friday’s always the busiest day of protests (in Bahrain),” commented one racing team member, who like many others did not want to be named. “So Saturday could be a likely day for any emergency meeting.”
Among the teams, McLaren has particularly close ties to the Gulf Arab kingdom. Bahrain’s sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat owns 42 percent of the McLaren Group and 50 percent of its automotive wing.
