Smuggling of housemaids from Bahrain ‘on the rise’

There are at least 30 violations recorded on a daily basis involving the smuggling of maids into the Eastern Province from Bahrain and other Gulf nations, officials from local recruitment offices have said.
They said that smuggling, aided by some recruitment companies, has increased because of the difficulty faced by Saudis in recruiting workers the legal route.
Saad Baddah, head of the Council of Saudi Chambers’ national recruitment and investors committee, said some domestic workers enter with visit visas from other Gulf countries.
They then renew these visas legally every three months. These workers cannot use labor visas from other Gulf nations, which are handled by the Saudi Ministry of Labor, to enter the Kingdom, he said.
Taiseer Al-Mufrij, spokesman of the ministry, warned that violators face penalties for breaking the country’s laws, which “may involve withdrawing the licenses of recruitment offices, and cutting off all their e-services.”
Ibrahim Al-Manshi, head of a local recruitment office, said many requests are submitted to bring the wives of drivers, mainly Indians, especially after recruitment from India resumed.
“It costs less to bring the wife of a driver or worker on a visit visa to live here with her husband as a dependent, than it does to recruit her as a domestic worker with a new labor visa, particularly since Indian recruitment requirements are still difficult and complicated,” he said.