DUBAI: Kuwaiti MPs have called on their government to slash the number of expat workers by half and end what they referred to as “their onslaught on public services,” national daily Kuwait Times reported on Monday.
MP Khalid Al-Saleh said the government should follow a proposal pushing for the deportation of 50 percent of the 3.3 million expats living in the gulf country over the next five years.
“The government must adopt serious measures to save the country from the (expatriate) typhoon that has taken up services and jobs,” Al-Saleh said, adding that “We have to work with the plan immediately so as to reduce the number of expatriates by 50 percent over the next five years, especially since a majority of them are marginal laborers.”
The Kuwaitization drive is part of the government’s push to recruit more of its citizens, a similar push is underway across the GCC where Saudi Arabia and Oman have also been trying to increase the number of locals in employment.
