Some positive words coming from the chairman.
WWE's 'Greatest Royal Rumble' is now in the rear-view mirror but the topics surrounding the event are still at the forefront of conversations in the wrestling world. One of which having to do with WWE's female talent roster possibly being compensated seeing as how there were no live events during the weekend of the 'Greatest Royal Rumble' and they also were not allowed to compete on the show. The reason being is that there are laws and traditions in Saudi Arabia which prevent women from doing a number of things such as competing at sporting events.
The Chairman of Saudi Arabia's Sport Authority Turki Al-Sheikh sat down with CNN for an interview to discuss what he called an "historic" event. Al-Sheikh shared that the Prince of Saudi Arabia Muhammad bin Salman has a vision to give women all their rights.
"Women make up half of [our] society. It is a part of the vision Prince Muhammad bin Salmon has; issues guidelines for us to ensure we pay attention to the women’s aspect, and give them all their rights. Which we can say have come a little late, but have come at the right time.” He continued, “We’re moving forward, and we don’t want anything to hinder our progress, or to be taken as an excuse for delaying that progress. We’re taking into consideration our traditions, and culture, and religion Islam."
There were a number of memorable moments that took place during show. One of which took place when Ariya Daivari walked down the aisle-way in front of the crowd with his brother Shawn Daivari to confront the Saudi Arabian prospects that were finalists in the WWE tryouts that occurred in Saudi Arabia. Shawn Daivari followed behind his younger brother waving around Iranian flag. Iran and Saudi Arabia severed ties with one another years ago and the segment was to play off of the conflict between the two counties. Ariya even received death threats for being a part of the segment and he released a statement noting that he was simply portraying a character.
Turki Al-Sheikh stated that he is aware that WWE has played off of scenarios like this in the past and labeled it a "very normal thing".
"This is a very normal thing." He said. "WWE usually corresponds to timely events. We remember in 1990 when we saw wrestlers from Iraq during the ‘Gulf War’, and in the 80’s when we saw wrestlers from the Soviet Union, and Iran, fighting against American wrestlers. This is part of the suspense that WWE does."
If you are going to use any of the quotes above, please credit CNN with an H/T to Fightful.com for the transcriptions.
