Six Kuwaiti charities authorized to collect donations for refugees

KUWAIT: Public Authority for Manpower officials are expected to meet with their counterparts from the union of domestic labor agencies later this month to discuss the possibility of cancelling an earlier decision preventing local domestic labor agencies from rehiring domestic helpers with different employers than their original recruiters. The meeting is expected to happen after the formation of the new Cabinet and naming the minister to be responsible for the authority, well-informed sources said.

The union has earlier filed a protest in this regard to the manpower authority and discussed the complaint with Minister of State for Economic Affairs Mariam Al-Aqeel, said the sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The union explained its demands to cancel the decision over moves by many foreign labor agencies to suspend exporting workers to Kuwait out of fear of the growing numbers of helpers that would return to their countries as a result, and that the decision causes embarrassment to Kuwait while negotiating with other countries.

The sources added that the domestic labor agencies believe that rehiring laborers is a right they have been deprived of since implementing law number 68/2015; which the government had enacted in a bid to fight human trafficking. The sources said the manpower authority will discuss the request soon and a decision is expected within the next two months at most. "The authority also plans on making a list with the names of fake and unlicensed domestic helper agencies to warn citizens and expats form dealing with them," the sources concluded.

Donations for refugees
Six local charities recently obtained the approval of the charities department at the ministry of social affairs to organize fundraising campaigns to collect donations to be used in countries harboring refugees. In this regard, informed sources said the charities signed affidavits to respect related laws and regulations including banning all cash donations and using K-Net, online donations, bank remittances, mobile apps and SMS messages through telecom companies instead.

'Sorcery' report denied
With the beginning of the first term exams in grades up to 11, it was reported that a student was caught in one of the schools with the possession of sorcery and witchcraft items while sitting for the exam. However, Education Ministry's assistant undersecretary for public education affairs Osama Al-Sultan denied any such reports, adding that he toured some primary and intermediate schools in the capital governorate on the first day of exams and everything was fine. Notably, midterm exams for the academic year 2019-2020 for grades 5-11 started yesterday with strict measures including inspections and banning mobile phones for both students and teaching staff before entering the exam halls.

Insurance agencies
In implementation of the fatwa and legislation department's decision, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI) started putting law number 25/2019 into practice by launching intensive inspection campaigns of various insurance agencies and closing some of them. In this regard, informed sources said MoCI closed at least three agencies working without a license. They added that Kuwait has a total of 136 insurance agents responsible for 75 percent of the insurance business in Kuwait in return for 25 percent per policy as fee, except for Afiya and government insurance policies.

By A Saleh