By A Saleh

KUWAIT: Responding to meteorologists' forecast of a cold wave and its impact on school students, Education Minister Saud Al-Harbi stressed that the Ministry of Education (MoE) is following the latest weather developments, noting that school directors are authorized to cancel morning assemblies if the weather is too cold. He stressed however that cold weather does not require closing schools.

Weather in Kuwait was dominated by dust and strong wind yesterday, causing low visibility and an imminent drop in temperature, said an official at Kuwait Control and Meteorological Center (KCMC). Meteorologist Abdulaziz Al-Qarawi further predicted that the temperature would drop today, noting that the western region of the country will have temperatures reaching down to zero degrees Celsius while the highest temperature in the rest of Kuwait will be between 10 to 14 degrees Celsius.

The wind, coming from the northwest, will be active at speeds of 20 to 50 kmph, indicated Qarawi who pointed out that the status of the sea will witness waves reaching over seven feet. The meteorologist indicated that the cold weather would continue until Thursday when temperatures are expected to rise.

In another educational concern, MoE announced its needs for new expat teachers for the school year 2020-2021 including male French, English, Science, Chemistry, Physics, Biology, Geology, Maths and Craft teachers and female Maths and Music teachers from expats already residing in Kuwait, adding that applicants must hold university degrees and can apply online on the ministry's website.

Moreover, informed sources said that MoE would make up for the remaining shortage by recruiting teachers from Palestine and Jordan (not Egypt and Tunisia) and that special committees will leave for this purpose by April or May at most. The sources added that around 500 teachers are needed for the new school year.

Spreading rumors
Kuwait Medical Association (KMA) yesterday filed a complaint against a blogger for slandering it on social media networks and spreading rumors that could undermine 'health security'. In this regard, KMA Chairman Dr Ahmed Thuwaini Al-Enezi said the blogger had questioned KMA's integrity and its major medical role as well as undermined public trust in the Ministry of Health (MoH), accusing it of not saying the truth about coronavirus infections. "Such tweets may cause panic," he warned, noting that freedom of speech is guaranteed for everyone but some people tend to misuse this right.

Expats' replacement
Well-informed sources said that the parliamentary human resources committee urged the government to provide it with the measures to be followed to replace 25,000 expat employees with citizens this year and the next one. The sources added that, in order to achieve the goal of 100 percent Kuwaiti employees in government bodies by 2023, the committee conditioned that replaced expats will not be rehired on monthly payment basis.

"The only exemptions will be MoE and MoH due to a lack of Kuwaiti graduates in those specialties," the sources explained, pointing out that acting Minister of State for Economic Affairs Mariam Al-Aqeel will attend the committee's meetings soon to discuss the government's policy in this regard and respond to inquiries.