Ethiopians threaten to protest in Kuwait

KUWAIT/RIYADH: Ethiopian workers in Kuwait threatened to protest yesterday after they were fired by their company. The Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour is investigating the matter after a cleaning company terminated 1,000 Ethiopian workers. The fired workers have filed a complaint at the ministry and asked to return to their duties or transfer to other companies. If their demands are not met, they threatened to stage a protest in Kuwait. The threats come a day after Saudi Arabian police clashed with foreign workers in a poor district of Riyadh, nearly a week into a visa crackdown in which thousands have been detained and an Ethiopian killed by police.

Yesterday, hundreds of illegal migrants targeted in the Saudi nationwide crackdown turned themselves in yesterday after security forces besieged the Riyadh neighbourhood. Men, women and children lined up carrying their belongings to board police buses transferring them to an assembly centre before their deportation, a week after a seven-month amnesty expired. Police said they intervened on Saturday following riots in the poor Manfuhah neighbourhood of the capital after foreigners attacked Saudis and other foreign expats with rocks and knives.


One Saudi and another person, whose nationality and identity remains unknown, were killed, said a police statement carried by the SPA state news agency. Another 68 people – 28 Saudis and 40 foreigners – were injured and 561 were arrested. The Manfuhah district of Riyadh is home to many illegal migrants, mostly from east Africa. Yesterday, police laid siege to the district while units from the National Guard and special forces were sent in, an AFP photojournalist said.

The Ethiopian government said on Saturday it was repatriating citizens who had failed to meet the deadline of a seven-month amnesty, citing reports that an Ethiopian had been killed by police. “They were trying to get them in the camp before repatriation and in that process… an Ethiopian has been killed with a police bullet, but we are verifying it,” foreign ministry spokesman Dina Mufti told AFP in Addis Ababa. Saudi police said on Saturday illegal migrants in Manfuhah have been given the chance to come forward and that accommodation has been made available while their repatriation is arranged.

Last Monday, the authorities began rounding up thousands of illegal foreign workers following the expiry of a final amnesty for them to formalise their status. Those considered to be illegal range from overstaying visitors and pilgrims seeking jobs to shop assistants and day labourers working for someone other than their sponsor. Having an official sponsor is a legal requirement in Saudi Arabia and most other Gulf states. Nearly a million migrants -Bangladeshis, Filipinos, Indians, Nepalis, Pakistanis and Yemenis among them – took advantage of the amnesty to leave.

Another roughly four million were able to find employers to sponsor them, but in so doing virtually emptied the market of cheap freelance labour. Expatriates account for a full nine million of the oil-rich kingdom’s population of 27 million. The lure of work, even in low-paid jobs as domestics or construction workers, has made the country a magnet for migrants from Asia as well as from poorer Arab states.

Saudis and expatriates say that casual workers who used to queue in public squares for odd jobs have virtually disappeared since police began strictly enforcing tough labour laws. The labour ministry said on Saturday it will continue to accept applications from undocumented foreigners seeking to legalise their status, but that they will be fined for the elapsed period since the amnesty ended on Nov 3.
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