Job Discussion Forums

[Balzac]

Hi,

I was wondering how many people have been affected by the clampdown after amnesty in schools, college and universities?

Has your place of work been affected? To what extent? Is it just the local hires like the Indian admin staff or others like the toilet cleaners and other ancillary staff? Is your ELT department affected?

There are reports that many colleges and unis have been employing non iqama holding staff (those only on visitor or business visas) and that many have had to let those staff members go or send them off immediately on an employment visa application run.

Some really big and longstanding companies in KSA have been affected by this.

Can anyone confirm this in their own workplace?

What's the skinny from other places in KSA?

Balzac

[currentaffairs]

Yes, the long and the short of it is you need an iqama to work here now. All the companies and universities that I know of have sent staff home to get iqamas if they weren't already on them.

[Balzac]

Yep CurrentAffairs,

that's seems to be the new dynamic. A case of "Iqama is the new business visa".

It's definitely a game changer as all the media reports and the chatter on Twitter et all suggests that the Saudis are not going to let up on this and they are 100% serious about getting everone into the system irrespective of reputation, wasta, or otherwise family connections.

I suspect the airlines will continue to do brisk business as the expats either leave on final exit visas or leave with the intention of returning on employment visas.

Only time will tell if this can be achieved without too much distress or hurting of the local economy, but with the riots in southern Riyadh last night ending in at least two deaths, and the street protests, this may just be the beginning of widespread unrest amng the poorer breathren working in KSA.

B

[jaffa]

Not in academia but the disappearance of the Nepalese guy from my local bicycle repair workshop is damn inconvenient I've got to say. I'm thinking of staging a riot myself to protest his deportation.

[sicklyman]

[Czaerana]

[jaffa]

Hehe

He did a brilliant job on punctures by slicing the old inner tube in half, flattening it out then pushing it back into the tyre to make it thicker. Then he put in the new inner tube. Genius. Now there's some local duffer who can barely operate a pump.

I picked up a bootleg copy of Monty Python's Flying Circus and have got to say that it really isn't funny at all. I reckon it was a semi naked woman per episode that made it popular. It's always been maintained that MP 'broke down the 4th wall of comedy', which in reality meant getting good looking chicks in lingerie past the censor.

[sicklyman]

individual episodes were hit and miss. But when they hit, boy did they hit. They redefined comedy.

Avoid the fourth/last series without Cleese who had left by then and was busy writing the classic Fawlty Towers with his wife.

[veiledsentiments]

The humor of the MP TV series normally escaped me... and I had rather assumed that it was cultural in many cases. But their movies were great... and Fawlty Towers definitely showcased the comic genius of Mr Cleese.

But... we do digress... again.

VS

[Balzac]

Umm feel free to discuss anything related to the original post

[rollingk]

I know of some managers of a couple of companies who were doing a sky is falling bit a while back, and was insisting that everyone get proper work visas over their vacations, but they seem to have recently relented -- not sure if this is just in keeping with their usual shortsightedness or means something more. There are certainly teachers still working without iqamas.

[scot47]

Would YOU work without an Iqama ?

[EnglishDoYouSpeakIt]

The bicala right next to my flat has been closed for like a week now. I guess the employees were all iqama-less. It was where I get my water jugs, now I have to walk an extra 100 meters (each way!) to the other bicala.

As far as my place of employment, it would seem everyone had an iqama to begin with as no one has vanished. It's a government institute so that's probably why.

[rollingk]

[trapezius]