JEDDAH — While reports that a ban on Bangladeshi recruitment turned out to be false, this hasn’t stopped recruitment offices in Jeddah from believing there’s such a ban in effect.
“We saw it everywhere in the newspapers so we stopped recruitment from Bangladesh,” said an employee at the Al-Khibrah Al-Tawelah recruitment office in Jeddah.
“Many Bangladeshis work for a few months and then run away,” he said, citing reasons for the decision.
“We don’t want any more problems; as soon as we heard the news of the ban we just followed it,” said an employee in another recruitment office.
The news of the ban on recruiting Bangladeshis was printed in the local press on Feb. 11. Arab News spent two days trying to contact an official at the Ministry of Labor who is willing to address this issue.
Eventually a person, who didn’t provide his name, confirmed that there is no ban as reported by the media, but that recruitment of Bangladeshis is declining.
“It is impossible to ban recruiting Bangladeshis all at once, but it is true that their number is decreasing,” he said.
The Saudi media consistently blames Bangladeshis for many or even most of the crimes in the Kingdom, especially organized crime.
However, since Saudi security officials do not issue incident reports in a manner that would allow for such analysis by the media, the statistical details of criminal activity is based mostly on newspaper reports and columns.
Nevertheless, numerous reported incidences of criminal activity committed by Bangladeshis has caused a public outcry and calls for their deportation from the country.
Labor Minister Ghazi Al-Gosaibi said no such ban was in place, but alluded to country quotas as one of the reasons for reduced recruitment.
Kuwait instituted a ban on Bangladeshi recruitment last year, citing crime committed by them. “We look forward to the day when we get to celebrate the departure of the last Bangladeshi here similar to what happened in Kuwait,” said Khalid Ibrahim, a Saudi teacher.
“We could then say with a big relief goodbye to pornography and alcohol, to our maid stealers, to the rapists of our children, to the counterfeiters of governmental documents,” said another 40-year-old Saudi government employee.
Saudi authorities are still issuing visas to recruit professionals and workers from Bangladesh, according to S.M. Haroon, the Bangladeshi labor counselor in Riyadh.
“To our knowledge several Saudi delegations are still in Bangladesh to recruit manpower,” he added.
Though some were pleased with the presumed ban, others had a different view regarding the attitude taken against the Bangladeshis.
“Bangladeshis may account for the highest number of recorded crimes in the Kingdom, but it doesn’t mean that all Bangladeshis here are criminals,” said Hussain Al-Ahmad, a bank employee in his 30s.
“It is unfair that some Saudis take a negative attitude and refuse to buy anything from a store that has a Bangladeshi working in it. It is just too much and this on its own may lead these foreigners to behave in an erratic way,” he added.
