Cairo: Kuwait has prohibited changes to data included in work permits issued for expatriates related to the name, birth date and nationality.
The country’s Public Authority of Manpower (PAM) explained that if an employer wants to make such modifications, he/she has to apply for cancelling the would-be-recruited worker in two weeks’ time from the issuance of date via the Sahel app for e-government services, and afterwards check with the Interior Ministry to amend the worker’s database and apply to obtain a new work permit.
The new measures come upon joint coordination between PAM and the ministry, Al Jarida newspaper reported, quoting PAM sources.
The aim is to head off manipulations practised in the past illegally to recruit labour holding nationalities for whom recruitment permits are on hold, the sources added.
Kuwait has recently toughened measures against illegal foreign residents and warned that any expatriate covering up an unlawful resident will be deported too.
Illegal foreign residents are estimated at 150,000 in Kuwait.
Kuwaiti individuals or companies employing illegals will face charges of unlawfully sheltering and covering up illegals.
Foreigners make up nearly 3.4 million of Kuwait’s overall population of 4.6 million.
The country is seeking to redress its demographic imbalance and replace foreign workers with its citizens as part of an employment policy dubbed “Kuwaitisation”.
In recent months, there have been increasing calls in Kuwait for curbing foreigners’ employment along accusations that migrant workers have strained the country’s infrastructure facilities amid economic repercussions from the COVID-19 pandemic.
