Yousef Al-Mohaimeed Al-Jazirah According to the latest statements of the minister of labor, there are currently 650,000 jobless Saudi men and women. He also said as many as 350,000 Saudis graduate from secondary schools every year compared to 100,000 from the universities. The minister said more than a million work visas were issued annually during the economic and construction boom in the Kingdom over the few past years. If we assume that all the graduates were employed, which is of course an impossible thing to do, this means that for every Saudi who is employed, there are two expatriates recruited. This also means that the labor market and the private sector are wide open for expatriates from various nationalities. The private sector at present is made up of two thirds of expatriates and one third of Saudis. This one third is doing no work at all and are being paid peanuts. They are classified within the concept of “fake Saudization”. Under this concept, private companies and establishments employ Saudis on minimum wages without assigning them any work to do. They use their names only to remain within the green Nitaqat zone (indicating businesses have met Saudization targets) that the ministry has imposed on them. These employed Saudis never come to their work. If the Labor Ministry in coordination with the Interior Ministry considered these cases as crimes of forgery and punished the culprit companies and establishments, this would be a logical procedure. These companies and establishments have breached the law and therefore have to be punished. I had wished so much the minister had revealed to us the exact rate of joblessness among Saudi women. We know that this rate is high but we need official figures to confirm it. We also need practical steps to reduce these unemployment levels. Is it possible that the ministry's plans to be carried out in collaboration with the Ministry of National Planning and Economy and the Ministry of Finance are simply based on three concepts consisting of working from home, taking part-time jobs or being involved in the programs for productive families? Are these all the ministry's programs for the employment of women in the private sector? No one is averse to the ministry's program to employ women in lingerie and accessories stores in markets and shopping malls that was started by the late Ghazi Al-Gosaibi, former labor minister. These programs were a success but they were not enough to absorb all the jobless women. The ministry needs to take serious steps and make realistic programs for the employment of women. These programs should be capable of absorbing a large number of women graduates and open more work opportunities for them. The ministry should not stop at enabling women to work from their homes or take part-time jobs, especially during the current boom in the labor market. If the unemployment rate is not cut down during these years of economic prosperity can we expect it to come down during the years of austerity? Do you think, Mr. Minister, that your esteemed ministry is doing much for the productive families compared to social media? Can your ministry market the products of these families better than Instagram? I think the ministry should look for new work fields for the women. It should bravely and strongly support the jobless Saudi women instead of reaping the programs already initiated by the Al-Gosaibi. If the ministry's programs for the employment of women are limited to the concept of working from home, doing part-time jobs or being part of the programs for productive families, then we will be in for a new high and unprecedented level of unemployment among women.
