Saudi Gazette report JEDDAH – Saudi Arabian Airlines (Saudia) told five female flight dispatchers who hold licenses from the General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) that it cannot offer job opportunities to them now, Makkah daily reported. “I don't think Saudia has any plans to offer such positions to women in the near future,” said Aisha Al-Jafari, who, together with four other Saudi women, studied at a private flight academy in Jeddah. “Saudi women have proved themselves in almost all fields and in some cases they ventured into male-dominated jobs and proved as effective and competitive,” added Al-Jafari. Although she likes her job as a flight dispatcher in the private sector, she says she dreams of joining Saudia because it is the country's national carrier. Nouf Al-Shuaibi said GACA promised the women who enrolled in the flight dispatcher diploma at the private flight academy in Jeddah that it would find them jobs. However, it did not live up to its promise, she claimed and called upon authorities to create job opportunities for herself and her colleagues who each spent over SR30,000 on tuition fees alone. Meanwhile, GACA, through its spokesman Khalid Al-Khaibari, denied that it had ever promised the five women jobs. “We granted nine girls, five of them Saudi, flight dispatcher licenses after they completed an accredited diploma. But we didn't give them any promises regarding jobs because GACA only grants licenses.” Makkah daily sent an e-mail to Saudia asking about the types of jobs offered for women and whether it will employ female flight dispatchers. The company did not answer the second question. However, it said there are 83 Saudi women among its staff and they hold positions in different departments ranging from information technology and customer services to financing.
