Raids end illegal expats’ presence in factories

By Ibrahim Naffee
Tuesday, February 3, 2015

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JEDDAH - The Labor Ministry crackdowns have succeeded in eliminating the illegal foreign workforce in Jeddah’s industrial city while factories are hiring women as replacements to cover the shortage, according to sources.

Many factories in the industrial city used to hire temporary expat workers to increase productivity at low cost.

“Many of the illegal Somali and Pakistani laborers have disappeared in the wake of the frequent labor raids on factories with some workers transferring their sponsorship to their employers,” Saeed Maki, an HR manager at a private company told Arab News.

He said the labor office inspectors conducted several raids to check the official documentation of expat workers.

“This move resulted in many factories legalizing the status of their workers or firing them,” Maki said.

He added that at the same time, several factories had hired women who were working in the packaging department. “There are more than 1,500 Saudi women working in the factories in Jeddah,” he said.

The new labor regulations in the Kingdom have banned the hiring of expatriate workers without official documentation.

Abdul Monem Al-Shahery, director general of the ministry in Makkah said that the raids used to be conducted throughout the week. “Even now, we are quietly carrying out our strategic plan to eliminate violators of the labor and residency laws including Saudis and expatriates,” he said.

A Somali resident in Jeddah told Arab News that he had been working for a year in an industrial factory located in the south of Jeddah.

“The factory used to pay me SR 1,500 but it refused to transfer my sponsorship.

I stopped working there due to the ongoing inspection campaigns and hope to find another job which will transfer my sponsorship and grant me legal status,” he said.

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