More and more foreign job aspirants are seeking employment opportunities in Saudi Arabia after Malaysia temporarily suspended recruiting migrant workers.

 

Considering the attraction of foreign job-seekers to Saudi Arabia, the Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Kathmandu has lifted the limit given to manpower agencies on the number of passports that can be submitted at the embassy for visa.

 

Earlier, the embassy used to accept around 600 passports for visa procedures on a daily basis and now it has started accepting around 1,000 passports per day.

 

The Saudi Arabian Embassy has authorised 312 local manpower agencies to send workers to their country. The recruitment companies in Saudi Arabia are required to approach only authorised agencies to hire foreign workers.

 

“Earlier, consular section used to accept only a limited number of passports from each manpower agency, but now there is no such limit,” Khalid Al Harbi, consular at Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Kathmandu, said.

Saudi Arabia has become a popular destination for Nepali foreign job-seekers this year. As per Department of Foreign Employment, a total of 80,506 individuals had taken final labour permit to work in Saudi Arabia during the first seven months of this fiscal. Between mid-January to mid-February — the last month of the review period — 13,656 individuals had taken final labour permit to go to Saudi Arabia, followed by Qatar (10,415).

 

Not too long ago, Malaysia was the popular destination for Nepali migrants. Nepali workers have diverted to other destinations in recent days as the demand from the country has dipped, value of ringgit has come under pressure and most recently the country has suspended recruiting foreign workers.

 

In Saudi Arabia, most semi-skilled and unskilled labourers from Nepal are engaged in construction sector. “There are skilled Nepalis working in Saudi as well, but they are nominal,” Al Harbi said, adding, “Saudi companies have had good experience with Nepali workers, which is why they have been hiring workers from Nepal without hesitation.”

 

Saudi Arabia is also preparing to open recruitment of caregivers from Nepal, which was stalled since a few years back. Nepal government has proposed government-to-government agreement to send caregivers from the country. Currently, Saudi Arabia is employing a high number of Filipinos as caregivers.

 

The Saudi Arabian Embassy in Kathmandu is also regularly organising meetings with operators of authorised manpower agencies to minimise the problems that were witnessed in the past. “We have strictly told the authorised agencies to only send people who are qualified for the job and if we find them engaging in any kind of irregularities, we suspend them from sending labour for a certain time,” Consular Al Harbi said.

He further said that this initiative of the embassy will surely minimise the grievances of the workers. In the past, many workers had faced various problems due to lack of proper orientation from concerned manpower agencies regarding job details, rules of the company, culture and country’s law, among others.

 

A lot of such problems have been solved as the embassy started scrutinising the agencies, as per Al Harbi. The embassy authorises manpower agencies only after properly studying their practices and the authorised agencies are monitored periodically, he added.