AN action plan to tackle the issue of illegal expatriate workers in Bahrain is underway, it was revealed yesterday.
Labour Minister and Labour Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA) board chairman Jameel Humaidan told MPs that out of 103,000 violating expatriate workers, 42,000 have so far registered under the new vocational employment system and 31,000 have left the country or taken a job under a sponsor.
“This leaves 26,000 violating expats,” said the minister, without making any mention of the remaining 4,000.
The minister was speaking during a debate in Parliament on the findings of an investigation into the performance of the LMRA.
“The government is not sitting idle, but an action plan is underway to bring the expatriate workers under our watch,” he said.
Meanwhile, expatriates coming to Bahrain on tourist visas could be prohibited from changing to work visas.
The proposal is amongst 39 recommendations put forward by the probe committee.
The committee’s report highlighted that 85,246 expats were allowed to change their visas, from 2019 to June 2023.
A total of 13,078 changed visas in 2019, 7,942 in 2020, 9,424 in 2021, 46,204 in 2022 and 8,598 until June this year.
Meanwhile, Interior Ministry’s Under-Secretary for Nationality, Passports and Residence Affairs (NPRA) Shaikh Hisham bin Abdulrahman Al Khalifa said tougher restrictions are being introduced to deter people from misusing entry regulations.
“We are urging airlines to not board anyone heading to Bahrain without a return ticket, residence permit or enough money,” he said.
“Anyway, immigration officers have the right to turn back anyone arriving on a visit visa for a job and not tourism.
“The new rules and regulations have led to a 37 per cent drop in such arrivals.”
He added that businesses in violation of CR (commercial registration) regulations or with a high number of employees are not being granted expat entry visas .
“We have daily inspections with the LMRA and the Bahrain Tourism and Exhibitions Authority and violators face action, up to deportation,” said Shaikh Hisham.
“We have blocked granting expat entry visas for businesses that don’t have employees actually working with them.”
He pointed out that out of 1.2 million entry visas granted last year less than one per cent were in violation.
LMRA chief executive Nibras Taleb said that since his appointment a few months ago all operations and statistics have been made transparent.
Inspections
“Since the start of this year, 32,000 solo and 600 joint inspections were conducted and 3,700 violating workers have been deported.”
The report also calls for a cancellation of a decision to provide some LMRA services in registration centres and allowing expats to register as skilled workers.
Other demands include: Having the government review all unsent information and documents in the possession of the LMRA, which were unsent to Parliament, and may lead to more findings; re-evaluate all expat employment policies and procedures; re-evaluate the current obligation of having all jobs advertised in the local Press; and launch a job search section for Bahrainis only on the LMRA website.
MPs are also demanding that the LMRA chief executive introduce a work plan, present reports to the board every three months, publish audited accounts in the Official Gazette, and present the responsible minister with annual reports detailing problems and hurdles.
In the recommendations, MPs are demanding a comprehensive plan from the LMRA on Bahrainisation, improving responses to complaints and grievances, resolving issues related to workers with expired permits, and producing job indicators and indexes.
Three recommendations come within MPs’ jurisdictions: Taking political action against all violations, amending the 2006 Labour Market Regulatory Law that would give grace periods, within the same law doubling the obligatory period for expats to stay with an employer from a year to two.
MPs have demanded tough action against housemaids and other domestic workers who they claim indulge in prostitution on their off days or return home drunk.
Separately, MPs voted unanimously on a request to set up a committee to probe medical services.
They also voted to withdraw another probe into the affairs of the Jaffari and Sunni Waqf (Endowments) directorates.
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