November 26, 2008	Wednesday	Ziqa'ad 27, 1429

KUWAIT CITY, Nov 25: Kuwait’s cabinet resigned on Tuesday in protest against an attempt by three lawmakers to question the prime minister about allegations his government is corrupt and has allowed public services to deteriorate despite the country’s oil riches.

The resignation of the 16-member government opened the door to speculation that the emir, the country’s head of state, would dissolve parliament and call elections to defuse growing tension between the two branches of government in Kuwait’s volatile democracy.

The Kuwait News Agency, however, quoted parliament Speaker Jassem al-Kharafi as saying the emir would not dissolve parliament.

Kuwait’s state television said the emir, Sheik Sabah Al Ahmed Al Sabah, received the resignation of his prime minister, Sheik Nasser Al Mohammed Al Sabah, but postponed a decision on whether to accept it.

The cabinet said his questioning before lawmakers — a common practice for government officials that is known in Kuwait as a “grilling” — did not conform to proper democratic practices.

It was to have taken place on Tuesday, but the cabinet members walked out of the parliamentary session just before.

According to state TV, the cabinet decried “chaos in parliamentary practices” that it said should not be allowed to continue and corrupt the society under the guise of democracy.

The three lawmakers accuse the prime minister of corruption, deteriorating public services and failure to move the country forward.

They also accuse the prime minister of intervening to allow an Iranian cleric who has been banned from entering Kuwait to visit the country this month. That is a sensitive accusation in the predominantly Sunni nation.

—AP