[1][2] Male citizens over the age of 21 voted for half of the members of their municipal councils.

[4][5] On 10 February 2005, the first round of the elections was realized in the Riyadh region and Islamists won the majority, taking all the seven available seats.

However, the winners employed much more advanced strategies such as internet and mobile phones that is regarded as a tactic frequently preferred by Islamist groupings in the region to expand their ideas.

Five of the six winners in Buraydah, the capital of the very conservative Qaseem province, also gained a similar clerical support.

However, in the urban centres of the eastern regions such as Dammam, Dhahran and Al Khobar that are inhabited by considerable Shi’ite population Sunni candidates won the seats with the help of the support they secured from fundamentalist clerics.