MANY company owners and managers who deal with manpower are exploiting expat workers and taking advantage of their ignorance of the law. The employers often use intimidation tactics if the workers demand their rights or file complaints. There are millions of expatriate workers in the Kingdom, who constitute about 26.4 percent of the Saudi population. Many company owners avoid treating their foreign workers according to the Kingdom's labor law and deprive them of their rights. As a result, these workers develop a poor image of the Kingdom and its people, something they take back home when they leave the country. Despite government efforts to increase awareness about labor law and the rights of workers in the private sector, few cases involving the private sector are reported because of various apprehensions. Many workers believe that they will not win the case against their companies if they decide to complain. Most of the workers interviewed say that they receive very little help when faced with such difficulties. Abrar, a Saudi woman in her 30s who works in the administration of a private company, believes that many private companies do not know how to deal with expatriate workers or intentionally deprive them of their rights. “I was told many stories about the injustices expatriate workers face. I saw it when I started to work and saw how badly the management treats them. This is bad because these people will take bad experiences with them when they go back to their home countries,” said Abrar, who did not want her surname to be revealed. Abrar worked in three companies and witnessed how expatriate workers are threatened by management not to complain or demand their rights. She added that they face discrimination when it comes to salaries and are always forced to do jobs other than what their contract stipulates. “When I encourage them to complain to the top managers against their direct bosses, they get cold feet and refuse to file complaints in the belief that they will win nothing,” she added. Salah Sabry, an Egyptian accountant at a private company in Jeddah, said he was warned before he came to Saudi Arabia about the ill treatment of some private companies. He experienced it first hand when he arrived in Jeddah to work with his company, which violated his contract and lowered his salary without his approval. “The basic salary agreed was SR4,000, but the company decided to lower it to SR2,500. When I complained to them, they promised to increase it again but nothing happened. They make me work for extra hours and when I complain, they threaten to send me on final exit. When I wanted to take it to a higher level, to the Labor Court, many of my friends said this would be useless and that companies always win,” he said. Sabry was left with no option but to terminate his contract and to return to Egypt with a bad memory of the company he worked for. He believes that many companies are exploiting workers by taking advantage of them and intimidating them. Mohammed Saleem, director of human resources for a private sector company, said many companies do not recognize the rights of expatriate workers. Expatriates themselves are also unaware of their rights. “Most of the time, injustice is done because they fail to report the wrongdoing or because they fear retaliation from the company if they contact the Labor Ministry,” he said. “Some owners treat their workers badly as if they have no rights and they believe the expatriates will be afraid to complain to the authorities. So these workers leave Saudi Arabia with a very bad experience,” Saleem said. Most expatriates are limited in their interactions and only befriend people from their community who also face the same treatment at work. “They don't deal with Saudis and so they only take back the bad impressions. I think we must find solutions. We must create awareness on the need to respect people and to be a good example for their country. I believe that most people have had bad experiences at work,” he said. “The majority of them avoid complaining to the authorities or the Ministry of Labor, which protects the rights of employees of all nationalities. There are many who have received their rights by officially complaining. People need to have the courage not to be intimidated and not to assume that complaining is useless,” he said.
