Kuwait National Assembly finalising demographic imbalance bill
Domestic workers and labourers at economic development projects excluded
Kuwait City: The Human Resources committee at Kuwait’s National Assembly has reviewed and will finalise a proposal regarding the demographic imbalance issue.
According to the draft law, obtained by Al Jarida newspaper, the committee would exclude nine categories from the law: Gulf citizens, spouses and children of Kuwaiti women, heads and members of political and international missions and organisations, military personnel, travel crew including pilots, assistants and cabin crew, labourers working on infrastructure and economic development projects, domestic workers, medical and educational professionals.
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“The draft law provides a new message for the future of Kuwait and addresses the demographic imbalance problem,” MP Khalil Al Saleh, head of the Human Resources committee, said.
Al Saleh indicated that the committee discussed and read all the laws related to foreign workers in order to produce a law that is complete, and includes penalties and violations, in addition to creating a new mechanism for the process of replacing expats with Kuwaiti nationals in job positions.
He emphasised that the draft law includes penalties for those violating the law, which will include a three-year prison sentence and a fine of up to 5,000 Kuwaiti dinars.
Marzouq Al Ghanim, the speaker of the National Assembly, said that the law stipulates that the Cabinet of Ministers shall determine, within six months of the date of which the law comes into effect, the maximum number of expats workers in Kuwait.
The law which is almost finalised, will be presented in the National Assembly for voting.
Demographic imbalance
Expats make up 70 per cent of the population in Kuwait, totalling around 3.4 million people compared to the 1.4 Kuwaiti population. In recent months, there has been ongoing discussion regarding the demographic imbalance in Kuwait, as expats make up the majority of the population.
Last month, several MPs along with the Ministry of Social Affairs, Mariam Al Aqeel, submitted proposals to the human resources committee.
Although anti-expat rhetoric has been on the rise, last month the National Assembly human resources committee said that a rapid reduction of expats could have a negative impact on the market’s purchasing power, the labour market, especially private sector, and the real estate market and private education market, according to Kuwait Times.