Harbi, one of the old Saudis who are still living in Jeddah's Al-Bawadi District, is forced to take his two sons with him to the district's mosque when he goes to perform dawn (Fajr) prayer due to fear of being attacked. Just a few days ago, Al-Harbi's neighbor was beaten up and robbed by a group of illegal African aliens when he was on his way to the mosque to perform Fajr prayer. The same thing happened to three others at different times. Some people dub Al-Bawadi District as “Mini Africa” after Chadian, Somali and Nigerian communities and several groups of people from Niger have controlled the district. Sultan Mazrou', one of the residents of the district, said there are four major areas controlled by Africans most of whom are Umrah and Haj overstayers. There is the Chadian neighborhood where Chadian nationals are living in dilapidated ramshackle houses. They specialize in stealing in general. Somalis living at the fringe of the district deal in drugs of different kinds. People from Niger control the eastern side of the district and next to them is a considerable number of Nigerian overstayers. Abdul Rahman Al-Zahrani said about ten years ago, Saudis were the majority in the district and the neighborhoods were named after the tribes and families living in them. However, after the African communities gradually took control of the district, the neighborhoods took African names. Al-Zahrani blamed the original Saudi residents as responsible for part of the problem as they left their houses and rented them to overstayers in return for a little money without caring about the nature of the tenants and whether they were legal residents. Col. Misfer Al-Je'aid, spokesperson of Jeddah Police, did not give a specific figure for the number of crimes committed by unidentified people. However, he said the rate of incidents by people he described as “weak spirited” in the unplanned districts is decreasing in general. He attributed this to the vigilance of the security men and cooperation of the citizens in this aspect. He added that the inspection tours and role being carried out by the secret and uniformed security patrols have had a big role in curtailing the spread of violators and their number. For his part, Brig. Gen. Muhammad Al-Asmari, Director of Makkah Province Passports Department, said the department's campaigns are continuing throughout the year to arrest Umrah and Haj overstayers besides continuous campaigns urging the citizens to cooperate with the Passports Department and not to shelter overstayers in the houses they own nor provide them jobs as they pose economic, security and health dangers in the country.
