Kuwait City: As the public sector prepares to reduce the number of non-Kuwaitis working in governmental jobs, work contracts of 148 expats are to be terminated, local media reported.
The Assistant Undersecretary for Administrative Affairs at the Ministry of Education, Rajaa Bouraki, asked all divisions within the Ministry to prepare a list of employees that are to be terminated at the end of the 2020-2021 school year.
The decision comes as the public sector is trying to achieve Kuwaitisation, a 2017 governmental policy that aims to replace all expats with Kuwaitis in order to create a 100 per cent Kuwaiti workforce.
Reduce number of expats
In January, the Minister of Trade and commerce revealed the Civil Service Bureau has drawn up a report to reduce the number of expats working in the public sector. The report stated that within two years the education sector should achieve 97 per cent of Kuwaitisation.
A few weeks before the report was released, the Ministry of Education indicated that 54 per cent of the non-Kuwaiti teachers stuck abroad, whose residency has expired, are no longer needed.
The 693 teachers that were reviewed in the report have been stuck outside of Kuwait since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic due to travel restrictions and lockdowns.
