Lawmaker to grill minister over financial, administrative violations at Kuwait Airways
Expat secretary obstructs Kuwaitis’ appointment at investment authority: MP
KUWAIT: MP Khalid Al-Otaibi announced yesterday that he plans to file a grilling motion against Finance Minister Nayef Al-Hajraf over financial and administrative violations at Kuwait Airways. The grilling is expected to be submitted at the start of next term, Otaibi said, noting that all supervisory means have been exhausted since Minister Nayef Al-Hajraf took over supervision of Kuwait Airways. He said Hajraf has a golden opportunity until October to deal with the Kuwait Airways violations, which “we informed him about and asked him to seriously deal with and stop wasting time without doing anything.” Otaibi said Kuwait Airways’ situation has gone beyond financial and administrative violations, reaching appointments and signing direct contracts in violation of the law, arguing that the misconducts could be affecting aviation and passenger safety as well as Kuwait’s reputation due to the wrong policies in the absence of competent leaders.
Meanwhile, MP Omar Al-Tabtabaei asked Minister Hajraf about the salaries of employees at Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA), adding that an expatriate secretary at the director general’s office prevents Kuwaitis from being appointed alongside her. Tabtabaei wanted to know the number of expat workers at the authority, their posts, salaries and incentives, besides plans to ‘Kuwaitize’ the authority’s employees. He also wanted to know about the only secretary at the director general’s office, adding that no Kuwaitis were appointed there because she is in control and keeps Kuwaitis from working with her. He asked for a copy of her contract, her salary and all rewards she received since her appointment until now.
Tabtabaei wanted to know whether the KIA managing director and one of the executives there are related, and the measures taken to guarantee professionalism and neutrality of decisions taken. He also wanted to know the degrees the director of the training department has and whether they were approved by the ministry of higher education. He asked for the financial incentives the director received after receiving his academic degree. He wanted to see degrees of all KIA workers who received them while at work and whether they were approved or not. Tabtabaei also wanted to know the number of KIA employees who graduated from Egyptian universities - both Kuwaitis and expats and their jobs, salaries, allowances and incentives.
Domestic helpers
MP Mohammad Al-Dallal proposed allocating a building near or inside the airport to examine domestic helpers or any laborers who enter the country, particularly those who leave then return again. The proposal also calls for not renewing residency permits until the helper undergoes a medical test.
MP Thamer Al-Suwait asked the health minister about the number of cancer cases in previous years including the number of affected males, females, age groups and the number of advanced cases in all Kuwaiti hospitals and the cancer center.
Expat advisors
Head of Fatwa and Legislation Department Salah Al-Musad said the department has not signed any contracts with new expat advisors since Oct 24, 2017, in an answer to a question by MP Abdulkareem Al-Kandari about terminating all expat law experts. The question was whether Musad issued a decision to terminate all expats appointed as legal researchers and sent a letter to the Civil Service Commission about the decision, and whether the fatwa and legislative department denied this.
Musad said no statement was made about terminating the services of all expats who are working as legal experts, but as a letter from the CSC recommended the appointment of an expat as a specialist legal expert, a letter was sent to the head of CSC to inform him that the department had decided not to appoint non-Kuwaitis. He said the department sent a letter on March 12, 2018 to the state minister for Cabinet affairs to discuss the renewal of loaning 10 advisors due to the department’s need for their accumulated expertise. He said it is not right for the question to interfere in what is related to the work of the executive branch, which is something that clashes with the principle of separation of powers.
Sleeping in mosques Minister of Justice, Awqaf and Islamic Affairs Fahd Al-Afasi said there should be no sleeping in mosques by any groups, adding that he referred the incident concerning a number of persons who were found sleeping inside a mosque’s women’s praying area for investigation. He said in an answer to a parliamentary question with regards to banning the Tabligh group from entering mosques until after receiving official approval, adding “the ministry does not allow any individual or group to give lectures or speeches without prior permission and under its supervision”. He said mosques cannot be used for sleeping and decisions were issued to the assistant undersecretary for mosque affairs to not allow any individual to sleep in mosques or hold any activity not approved by the department the mosque belongs to.
Public schools Education Minister Hamed Al-Azmi said that the number of students in public high schools is 84,485. He said in an answer to a question from MP Jamaan Al-Harbash that the number of Kuwaitis in the secondary stage for the year 2017-2018 was 73,932 of both genders, while non-Kuwaitis made up 10,553. He said Ahmadi education zone has the largest number at 17,055 students, while the lowest number is in Mubarak Al-Kabeer with 6,626 students.