When Mohammed bin Nayef (b. 1959), the son of the Saudi Minister of Interior, inherited his father’s role in 2012, Western media and governments welcomed what was dubbed as a courageous move by King Abdullah to bring in Western-educated second-generation princes into senior roles. It was no surprise that Mohammed succeeded his father, who had groomed him for the role since 1999. He was hailed as the brain behind eliminating al-Qaeda operatives — or more accurately evicting them to nearby Yemen — rehabilitating terrorists and keeping an eye on internal security matters. Saudis were not surprised by Muhammad’s appointment, but many were apprehensive.

Today, Mohammed bin Nayef controls the most important state within the Saudi state, namely that imposing structure in the heart of Riyadh, built to intimidate a restless youthful population. With thousands of employees, the Ministry of Interior is a total institution that controls even the air that Saudis breathe. From local government, morality police, intelligence services, security forces, the judiciary, and municipalities, the Ministry has the upper hand. It can undermine the king's rhetoric about reform by arresting reformers, which it did in 2004. The Ministry of Interior can arrest citizens, cancel cultural events, ban people from travel, confiscate passports, and send its security forces to quash demonstrations and even shoot protestors. The heavy hand of this total institution was strengthened as the War on Terror became a carte blanche to rule without accountability, arrest without warrant and detain indefinitely. The Ministry of Interior makes the laws and breaks them without the pressure to explain, justify or apologize.

Saudi reformist activists who had endeared themselves to the king found themselves arrested by the Ministry’s agents in 2004, when petitions asking for political reform were presented to the king. The king may adopt the rhetoric of reform and the pretence of listening to his subjects, but the Ministry of Interior has no room for endearment. Its intimidation tactics oscillate between direct violence against citizens in the streets and prisons and indirect controls under religious guises and the spread of piety and propriety. Its security forces have truly earned the nickname of "early morning visitors," zuwwar al-fajr, who often raid homes, break doors, search and arrest across different ideological divides from hardline Islamists to liberal youth. 

The heavy handed policing techniques of the Ministry of Interior have not gone without criticism. Over less than a decade, Saudis have moved from sending petitions complaining about the Ministry’s excessive and unjustified total governance to openly defying its many security forces on the ground.