We are all aware of the problems and difficulties when dealing with the armies of foreign workers who have come to the Kingdom with no prior knowledge of Arabic or the country’s Islamic culture, local customs and traditions. Many still have no knowledge of Arabic, the Kingdom’s official language, despite having been here for years. Still recruiting and employment offices continue to bring in large numbers of workers who don’t speak a single word of the country’s official language. And to make matters even worse, many of the workers are unskilled and have never been trained to do the jobs they were brought here to do.
The simple question is why is the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs does not stipulate that foreign workers brought into the country should have a good command of Arabic? Such a requirement should be a prerequisite for employing foreign workers. Imagine the difficulties and inconvenience Saudis face in shops, restaurants, hotels and other public places where the overwhelming majority of those working there have no knowledge of Arabic. To be able to communicate with these individuals, Saudis resort to using a mixture of broken Arabic and words borrowed from a range of other languages.
As a nation proud of its language and cultural identity, we should not compromise on these issues or allow our culture to be eroded by foreign influences because of huge numbers of workers from different nationalities and different cultural and social backgrounds.
Workers in both the public and private sectors should be required to have some basic knowledge of Arabic as a condition for working here. Recruiting and employment offices should be obliged to see that their workers undergo language training courses lasting at least for three months and focusing on the areas of employment for which the workers have been hired in the first place. If the worker passes the test, he should be hired but if he fails, he must be sent back to his home country. The public interest should come first before all others.
