The Ministry of Commerce and Industry has prevented a number of influential and well-known people from traveling because they were involved in tasattur cases. The revelation was made by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry anti-tasattur director Dr. Abdullah Al-Eneizi at a lecture at Taif Chamber of Commerce and Industry on Tuesday. During his speech Dr. Al-Eneizi revealed that over SR140 billion is lost from the national economy because of tasattur which is when foreigners pay Saudis to run businesses under their names. He also revealed that 90 inspectors are now being dispatched to discover tasattur cases, Asharq Arabic daily reported. He said: “The Ministry is considering giving tasattur staff three annual salaries and will discuss with the Ministry of Education the possibility of adding topics in school curricula about tasattur.” The anti-tasattur department has already received 300 calls reporting tasattur while last year the calls were much less than this number. Dr. Eneizi said: “Last year we registered 1,127 tasattur cases and Arab expatriates represented 50 percent of these cases, while 300 cases were referred to the Bureau of Investigation and Prosecution and are still being looked into.” The ministries of labor and rural and municipal affairs have been told to report any suspicious cases and violations. He also indicated that specially trained citizens may be allowed to inspect commercial violations and will be rewarded part of the fine imposed for violation of tasattur regulations. Dr. Eneizi also insisted that citizens must report any suspicious cases of tasattur even if they are not confirmed as it is the job of the ministry to investigate such cases. He said: “Citizens who report tasattur cases will receive 30 percent of the fine imposed on the violator. Last week a citizen in Madina reported a tasattur case and got SR60,000 of the fine as a reward.”
