Kuwait new labour law to abolish sponsorship system

Manama: Kuwait's new labour law draft will include a government suggestion to abolish the sponsorship system and to set up a non-profit authority to oversee the conditions and status of expatriates, the social affairs and labour minister has said.

"The authority will also be tasked with assessing the needs of private and public establishments and companies in human resources and will cooperate closely with the relevant embassies on Kuwait's needs for foreign workers," Mohammad Al Afassi said.

The proposed changes will also call for a separation between the labour and social affairs to help set up an independent labour authority that will tackle the huge responsibilities, the minister said in a statement to Al Qabas daily.

Kuwait, under Al Afassi, has been pushing for a better deal for the hundreds of thousands of expatriates living in the northern Arabian Gulf state. The sponsorship system, kafala, mandates that expatriates be sponsored by a local employer to obtain a work and a residence permit, giving sponsors the possibility to control a foreign worker's entry into and departure from the country as well as his legal and professional status.

"We totally reject the violation of the expatriates' rights and we will confront all visa traffickers," Al Afassi said.

The labour law draft is expected to be reviewed by the parliament during the new term. Several lawmakers have supported the efforts to adopt new laws regulating the labour market among mounting opposition from several quarters.

The fight against traffickers in people should see active participation from several officials, Badr Al Douwaila, a former labour minister, said.

"The war on the phenomenon of trafficking in residence permits and the drive to name and shame traffickers should be confined to one minister. All those involved in such malpractices, be their state employees, business people, will be denounced because this is matter about the reputation and the destiny of a country," he told Al Qabas.

At a press conference following a meeting with representatives of the International Labor Organization (ILO) visiting Kuwait, social affairs and labour undersecretary Mohammad Al Kandari said that "Self-employed expatriates such as carpenters, blacksmiths, barbers, butchers and mechanics, will be allowed to sponsor themselves and will not have to be under a Kuwaiti sponsor."

The move is one of the several steps the government is mulling as an alternative to the sponsorship system, he said.
ILO regional manager Nada Al Nashef welcomed moves by Kuwait to scrap the sponsorship system, saying that Kuwait was among the first countries that sought assistance from the ILO to carry out studies to find alternatives to the system.

The ILO official said that she looked forward to the adoption of the new labour law that would abolish the sponsorship system.

Bahrain in August became the first Gulf cooperation Council country to scrap the system, a move that was warmly welcomed by labour and rights activists, but fiercely resisted by several businesses.

Bahrain said that by allowing foreign workers to switch jobs without the consent of the employers, it sought to rectify a wrong situation that Majeed Al Alawi, the labour minister and the driving force behind the move, likened to "modern-day slavery."