Expats filling vacant imams’ posts in Hail

HAIL: In the absence of enough imams during Ramadan in Hail, officials have no choice but to fill the gap with expatriates, according to an online newspaper.
Omar Al-Hammad, director of the regional office of the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Call and Guidance, said that citizens have not shown an interest in jobs as imams of the mosques due to low salaries. In the mosques of some new localities there is nobody to lead prayers.
He said the normal salary of imams of mosques does not exceed SR1,800. People who agree to work as imams get even less than that. The local branch of the ministry cannot pay more than 50 imams.
“We are trying to find a solution to the non-availability of imams. We are consulting Qur’an memorization circles as well as hiring expatriates to work as imams under pre-determined terms and conditions. Even if an expatriate is recruited for the purpose, the job is considered vacant. If a citizen applies for the job it would be given to him,” said Al-Hammad.
The director said that the mosques were built under certain conditions and requirements; they are not built randomly. One of the conditions is that there should be a distance of 250 meters between two mosques and 500 meters from grand mosques. This is a logical distance, but in some areas like Al-Khazami there are a number of mosques at a distance of just 200 meters, he said.
In some areas imams are not available because there are new mosques which opened with the start of Ramadan; therefore, there has been no sufficient time to find imams for such mosques.
The number of jobs provided for Ramadan is also less due to disinterest among citizens. Local imams are also not available for areas where the majority of the population is expatriate workers.