Saturday 20 / April / 2024
MUSCAT: “I have finally decided to leave Oman. They are cutting our salaries, citing tough economic conditions. Besides, wages often get delayed. With a number of people leaving the company, workload is piling up. It has become quite difficult to meet my family expenses with my reduced salary. It is true that my children are studying here, but I don’t want to continue like this.”
This was Gopal Kumar N, an administration official working with a construction company. His story is no different from that of many others like him.
Trade union officials and experts predict that the ‘expat exodus’ that began in 2016 will continue this year.
While the oil price, to which Oman’s economic fortunes are currently intrinsically linked, has begun to creep back up, austerity will very much remain a live issue in the Sultanate in 2017.
Last week’s State Budget made that clear, and consequently, expatriate workers will continue to grapple with the tough decision about whether to pull out.
“Economic conditions are still bad. Salaries continue to be delayed in Oman. Projects are facing trouble due to delayed bill clearances.
“I think expatriates working at mid and senior level jobs would continue to leave Oman this year too, as they did in 2016,” Shahswar Al Balushi, the CEO of Oman Society of Contractors (OSC), told the Times of Oman.
“Till the economy recovers, expatriates in Oman will continue to face the same conditions. The 2017 budgetary allocation for development expenditure will only cover the pending bill payments. As a result, new projects will have a very slim chance in 2017 to receive a go ahead,” the CEO, who also leads the Tanfeedh Labour Market lab, added.
Mohammed Al Faraji, a trade unionist leader, said, “Layoffs are happening in Oman. Many expatriates are either leaving their jobs or are being removed as companies find themselves in a bad shape.
“On Tuesday, we updated the Shura council about the layoffs and will also brief the Ministry of Manpower’s joint meeting, scheduled for this month.”
Latest government statistics reveal that the number of skilled expatriate workers coming to Oman is going down.
An official at a money exchange house also confirmed a dip in remittances from mid and senior level workers.
“The trend started in 2015 and is still continuing. Our remittance records confirm that mid and senior level officials are voluntarily leaving or were being asked to leave Oman,” Rajan B, general manager at Al Jadeed Exchange, told the Times of Oman.
A travel agent in Muscat said expatriates were still booking one way tickets, a trend that was noticed earlier.
“This shows that conditions in Oman were not showing any improvement. This month also, we saw one way tickets being booked by some expatriates. They were all leaving Oman, having given up their jobs,” the travel agent said on condition of anonymity.
Hundreds of blue and white collar expatriate workers have been left in a lurch as companies are facing a tough time.
“In our company, around 86 workers, including skilled and unskilled, find themselves stranded as they have not been paid their salary for the last six months. Tomorrow onwards, food will also be a problem at the camp as the catering unit has decided not to deliver food since the company has failed to clear their bills,” an expatriate engineer at the company in Nizwa said.
“If our dues are cleared, we will go back,” the engineer added. The stranded workers have filed a complaint with the Ministry of Manpower, seeking their unpaid salaries.
