DAMMAM: On most Saudi and Bahraini highways, motorists can travel 100 km in an hour, but on the causeway that connects the two countries, bureaucratic rigmarole and closed booths can make the 25 km trip last as long as four hours or more.
Now businessmen, students and air travelers are urging authorities in charge of the causeway to streamline immigration and customs procedures to make travel easier.
Thanks to the King Fahd Causeway, Bahrain has become a popular departure and return point for air travelers in the Eastern Province cities of Dammam, Alkhobar and Jubail.
A number of airlines arrange coaches to ferry passengers between Saudi Arabia and the airport in Manama. For many air travelers it is easier to travel to Bahrain to get connecting flights to their destination rather than taking the trouble of going all the way to King Fahd International Airport in Dammam, which is more than 80 km from the city center.
For college students, Bahrain has become an attractive destination because of the presence of many world-class educational institutions. Many students make a daily trip to Bahrain over the causeway.
However, the heavy traffic not just during weekends but also during weekdays along with cumbersome immigration and customs procedures on the bridge has resulted in calls to rethink the process.
“It is very frustrating sometimes,” said journalist Merza Al-Khuwaildi, who has to visit Bahrain frequently for various seminars and business conferences. “There must be some way of streamlining the whole process. On a number of occasions I have seen students bursting into tears on the bridge for not making it in time to attend examinations or important lectures at their universities or colleges or institutes in Bahrain.”
The causeway is an excellent facility, he says. It has opened up a whole new world for Saudi and expatriate communities in the Eastern Province. However, it becomes nightmarish when the 25 km journey, which should take not more than 30 minutes, becomes a three- or four-hour ordeal. He notes there are a number of booths to process immigration and other requirements “but on any given day half of them are not working.”
Al-Khuwaildi says he was caught up on the bridge recently for seven hours. “I was heading to Bahrain for an important media conference in Manama. I was simply stuck on the bridge because ostensibly the system had crashed. It took them seven hours to put it back online. You can imagine the chaos that ensued on the bridge.”
Pakistani businessman Amjad Qureshi, who makes regular visits to Bahrain in connection with his work, says the causeway is a great blessing, and the authorities have been making regular efforts to ease traffic congestion. He says he has not faced dire straits but wonders why a one-window clearance system is not adopted.
Currently, a Bahrain-bound person from Dammam on the causeway has to go through nearly six windows. First is the toll booth. Here the King Fahd Causeway Authority (KFCA) collects SR20 per vehicle. Next is the police clearance window. Here they check vehicle registration.
“They basically ensure that the vehicle rightly belongs to the person who is crossing the bridge,” Qureshi said. After thorough verification, they issue a clearance paper. Window No. 3 is the immigration counter where the exit/re-entry visas are checked and stamping done. At window No. 4, you produce the police clearance paper issued at window No. 2. Now the person is out of Saudi Arabia. When he enters the Bahrain side of the bridge, the first window is Bahraini immigration. Once you get the entry stamp, you go to window No. 2 for customs. Here they check your baggage and issue an all-clear. At window No. 3, you arrange Bahraini insurance for your car. “This is basically a counter for a Bahraini insurance company that insures you and your vehicle for 24 hours or for the duration of your stay in Bahrain,” pointed out Qureshi.
Businessmen who regularly travel to and from Bahrain say going through six windows, especially during rush hours, is ridiculous. “In this day and age, there surely must be ways of getting all these things done at one booth,” said businessman Ibrahim Al-Maghlooth. “The idea should be to make commuting on the causeway easier — not more difficult. That is exactly what is happening on the bridge these days.” He points out that a lot of Saudi companies and multinational firms have their staff staying in Bahrain and making a daily visit to their Saudi workplaces. “For them, this is a big problem and needs to be sorted out as soon as possible,” he said.
One solution that journalist Al-Khuwaildi suggests is the issuance of eGate, a type of technology that is widely used in Dubai and through which one need not go through the manual immigration process. “This is an electronic card with a magnetic strip and can be used at any point of entry and exit in the Kingdom. This has all the details of the person, and you just swipe it at airports or ports, and that is it. Everything is recorded,” he said.
Some have suggested that since the majority of people using the causeway are either citizens or residents of Gulf Cooperation Council member states that organization could provide a venue for the two nations to simplify the process.
According to reports in newspapers, the causeway authority understands the difficulties that commuters face. However, the reports suggest it finds itself in a difficult situation because there are several independent government organizations involved in various procedures that need to be carried out at any point of entry or exit. “Immigration is a different government department, and so is customs,” wrote Saad Al-Zubairi recently in a column. “Unless and until all government departments come together and unify their procedures, not much can be done to alleviate the suffering of the causeway commuters.”
The problem is expected to worsen next week when schools and colleges take a two-week spring break. “There will be a huge rush to Bahrain, and we can expect all sorts of difficulties at the causeway,” Al-Khuwaildi added. Since its celebrated opening in 1986, some 170 million people and 71 million vehicles have crossed the bridge, the largest in the region, said Badr Al-Otaishan, director general of the King Fahd Causeway Authority. In his most recent comments, Al-Otaishan said a consulting firm has carried out a survey to expand the service island in the middle of the causeway by 60 percent. The expansion work is expected to end by 2012.
