ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s top diplomat in Riyadh, Raja Ali Ejaz, on Thursday praised recently announced Saudi labor reforms that will ease foreign workers’ contractual restrictions, saying they would significantly benefit Pakistani workers in the kingdom.
Saudi Arabia announced this week that it would abolish a seven-decade-old sponsorship system known as kafala. The reforms, to take effect in March 2021, aim to make the Saudi labor market more attractive by granting over 10 million foreign workers the right to change jobs and leave the country without employers’ permission.
Saudi Arabia, which chairs the Group of 20 major economies (G20) this year, is seeking to boost its private sector as part of an ambitious plan to diversify its oil-dependent economy.
“The reforms are expected to benefit Pakistani workers and we congratulate the Ministry of Human Resource and Social Development,” Ejaz told Arab News on Thursday.
The new initiative will base the relation between employers and workers on a standard contract that needs to be certified by the government, and will allow workers to apply directly for services via an e-government portal, instead of a mandatory employers’ approval.
The ministry aims to certify the contracts of all foreign workers by the end of the first quarter of 2021.
Ejaz said the reforms were grounded in best international practices, and the new system would activate the employer-employee contractual agreement through digital documentation, which would resolve administrative glitches.
“The new initiative will alleviate the problems of those workers who sign work agreements in Pakistan and are then asked to sign another agreement in the kingdom,” Ejaz said, adding that the new system would also help Pakistani workers search for new jobs on the expiry of their contracts while still residing in the kingdom.
“We all have a sense of freedom and empowerment now,” said Javed Chaudhry, a Pakistani expatriate from Gujrat who has been working in the kingdom for the last four decades. “I have worked in Saudi Arabia for the last 40 years. It was our dream to get such a facility.”
“For the first time, I will not be under any obligation to seek approval from anyone to visit my family in Pakistan,” Chaudhry told Arab News via phone from Jeddah. “I will be able to travel more freely to see them and perform my job without undue pressure.”
Another Pakistani worker, Syed Qamar Abbas, who works in an electric equipment factory in Dammam, said the new labor policy promised more rights to workers.
“It will give us more rights and freedom. Until now, we were at the mercy of our sponsor for everything,” he said. “Now the sponsor’s name will be removed from iqama [work permit] … We will also be able to take up another job once our contract with our company comes to an end.”
Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 reform plan is a package of economic and social policies designed to free the kingdom from reliance on oil exports.
The currently applicable kafala system generally binds a migrant worker to one employer, a system that rights groups say leaves workers vulnerable to abuses.
