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figures being close to that of the New York Times’ range. It gave the total number of

employees as 7,299, of which 4,303 were Bahrainis. 170 There were no layoffs of

local employees in Bahrain during this time to support Al-Bakir’s statement.

The ideas the local press produced were held by some individuals in Bahrain,

as a British traveler Roderic Owen documented in his memoir on how locals

attacked BAPCO’s policies as they questioned him on the topic: ‘Why should

Europeans get paid one rupee more than Bahrainis?’, ‘Why doesn’t BAPCO do more

for Bahrain?’ Comparisons were made with the Arabian-American Oil Company

(ARAMCO) of Saudi Arabia in terms of employee benefits. Underlying all this was a

belief that ‘All the oil belongs to the Bahrainis’. 171

Although Bahrain’s petroleum company employed a substantial amount of

Bahrainis, none of its senior employees at the time were locals, mainly due ‘to the

lack of educated Bahrainis’ in the field. Furthermore, a considerable number of

Bahrainis failed to complete their education after acquiring basic educational skills

at the secondary level. It would take years for locals to reach a level that would

enable them to compete for higher managerial posts. Europeans earned higher

wages in comparison to locals to compensate them for moving from the comfort of

their technologically-advanced environments to Bahrain. Comparing BAPCO’s pay

and benefits to that of ARAMCO was unfair, as the Saudi company’s production and

revenues way surpassed that of Bahrain’s BAPCO. 172

170 The Bahrein Petroleum Company Limited in Awali, BAPCO’s Library, BAPCO’s 1951 Annual
Report.
171 R. Owen, The Golden Bubble: Arabian Gulf Documentary (London: 1957), 226-27, hereafter The
Golden Bubble.
172 Hay, ‘The Impact of the Oil Industry on the Persian Gulf Shaykhdoms’, 361-72 (363).

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