I wish I could take His Excellency the Minister of Labor and Social Affairs on a five-day journey to five Saudi cities. I want him to see for himself how certain urban centers have become Little Dhaka and Little Delhi — or something in between.

If His Excellency’s time allows, I will take him to every lane and alley where our youth are experiencing the bitter taste of unemployment. I will show the minister, whom I am sure knows these things inside out, how our youth and many others have been turned into “mercenaries” knocking at the doors of businesses owned by foreigners. Things have taken a turn for the worst with our youth hired and sponsored by the very people who were brought here to work. All this is being done under the very watchful eye of the law that seems to protect, instead of to penalize, those involved in commercial cover-ups.

If my financial conditions allowed, I would buy His Excellency the Minister five air tickets to five world cities. Together we would see how London is indeed for the British, how Madrid is for the Spanish, how Peshawar is the city of the Pakistani and the Afghan. It will then be up to him to make the comparisons and issue the judgment.

Allow me, Your Excellency, to be frank and say that what was acceptable during the boom years is no longer acceptable today. It is not acceptable when the governor of one of the Kingdom’s regions announces that unemployment in the region exceeds 24 percent while the number of expatriates in that region is more than half the local population. It is no longer acceptable for the files of job seekers to pile up at civil service offices where more than 200,000 files of college graduates are already waiting while every month workers equal to this number enter the country.

Your Excellency, our youth are now working as security guards, in workshops and in restaurants. All that you need to do is weigh and balance things and bring them under control in a manner that guarantees a decent living for them. If your time allows, I will take you to the private establishment where I work where eight Saudi youths are employed. Their salaries range from SR1,500 to SR3,000 per month. There seems to be no way the situation will improve so long as the same big fish control the private sector.

Mr. Minister, please pay no heed to the commonly heard assertion that our youth are self-indulgent, lazy and living in comfortable idleness by choice. This may once have been true but it is history now. Our youth crowd every place in search of work. I wish you would listen to the voices of the weak and oppressed. I wish you would react to the amount of money transferred out of the Kingdom.