JEDDAH, 19 September 2005 — The Primary Committee for Settling Labor Disputes in Jeddah has set Oct. 1 as the date for its verdict on the fate of 1,000 former employees of Al-Rajhi Commercial Foreign Exchange. The employees lost their jobs when Al-Rajhi merged with the newly formed Bank Albilad.
A large number of the plaintiffs were in the court yesterday along with their attorneys from the Abu Rashed Law Office. There were also representatives from both Albilad and Al-Rajhi banks. Before the announcement, the plaintiffs expressed their fears that Albilad would continue to stall; once the announcement had been made, however, a sense of relief was evident.
Closing statements were given yesterday by both parties and according to the plaintiffs’ lawyer, Khaled Abu Rashed, “We are very optimistic and I genuinely believe the verdict will be in our favor.” He added that all the required official documents in support of the plaintiffs’ claims had been lodged with the court.
Abu Rashed said Albilad had argued that there was no merger between the two institutions and that the settlement of financial rights did not necessarily mean payment of those rights. At past court hearings, Albilad’s representatives failed to respond to the plaintiffs’ claims. The court had made it clear that even if they failed to respond at yesterday’s hearing, it would still issue its final verdict.
The case began over five months ago when the Cabinet approved the merger of all foreign exchange agencies in the Kingdom, including Al-Rajhi, to form Bank Albilad. However, Albilad refused to hire the Al-Rajhi employees despite Article 89 of the Labor Law, which states: “The contract of the employees of any institution shall remain in force even after cases of merging.” Abu Rashed’s argument is that this is clear and unequivocal.
Albilad representatives failed to attend the first court hearing, claiming that they had not received the summons. At the second hearing, they asked the court to give them more time in order to respond to the plaintiffs’ lawyers.
