Suleiman Al-Hameed, former head of social insurance and a member of the Shoura Council, has accused the Ministry of Labor of misinformation when it announced that 700,000 people were employed last year.

He said the social insurance database stated that 104,000 women were employed in the construction sector, according to Ministry of Labor reports. The Ministry of Labor depends on its Saudization (nationalization) program, “Nitaqat,” that relies on input from the social insurance database.

“According to reports from the Central Department for Statistics and Information, the unemployment rate rose by 200,000 from the previous year, while the Ministry of Labor said that the number of recruits in the private sector reached 1.7 million for the same period, which is a 33-percent increase,” Al-Hameed said.

“With these facts and figures, how can they say 700,000 have been recruited? The danger lies in the ministry’s adoption of fictitious numbers. This may lead to taking dangerous decisions and delaying other more pressing concerns. The Nitaqat program caused this fault and it should be corrected,” he added.