Minister of Public Works Hosam Al-Roumi

KUWAIT: Minister of Public Works Hosam Al-Roumi stressed all municipal managers have been instructed to launch inspection tours in various private residential areas to warn and evict bachelors living there and receive residents' complaints. The crackdowns will target houses where units are rented to single expatriate men in violation of the law, which bans renting rooms or annexes in government houses.

E-lease contract

Well-informed sources expected that a unified e-lease contract will be in use before the end of this year and stressed that the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI) is currently preparing the contract's final form. The sources added that the Kuwait Real Estate Brokers Union had prepared an e-from of the contract with clauses that protect both tenants' and owners' rights. He added that if approved, the new unified lease contract will be issued from real estate brokers' offices instead of the current contracts sold in bookshops.

Meanwhile, a number of real estate owners stressed the new contract will put an end to various cases of manipulation, reveal true rent values and put an end to many problems facing both tenants and landlords, as well as protect both sides' rights. Notably, many regional countries have already started using e-contracts, while Kuwait still uses over seven types of contracts to which additional clauses can be added.

12 projects

Finance Minister Nayef Al-Hajraf said revenues made from the new rent values of 12 projects built according to the public-private-partnership (PPP) rules had added over KD 16 million to the state budget. Hajraf added that the projects' old rent value was only KD 3,624,903, while the new one is KD 20,068,390. Hajraf added it is still early to assess the use of the fingerprint system in various ministries, noting that initial indicators in most of them show that employee discipline is on the rise. He added 44 finance ministry employees had resigned since the use of the fingerprint system.

Fake certificates

Education Minister Hamed Al-Azmi stressed that the ministry of higher education is currently examining all certificates presented to it including recent ones and those presented in earlier years. Azmi added that in case any are suspected to be fake, it would be referred to the public prosecution at once. He also noted that the ministry will prepare periodic statistics about fake certificates and those involved.

By A Saleh