September 2004

22/09/2004
Job projections far from realistic
Vol XXVII NO. 186 Wednesday 22 September 2004

By AMIRA AL HUSSAINI


BD200 a month? No thanks, I would rather sit at home.

After 12 years at school, four to five years at university, three to four years' searching for a job, is this all a Bahraini is worth?

A survey has just been completed on ways to reform Bahrain's labour market and the results seem to read like a page from the Doomsday Book.

Peasants will have to toil in private sector companies, if they are lucky to land a job, that is, for BD200 a month, says the study.

Seventy-five per cent of all jobs in the private sector pay less than BD200 a month, with labour productivity at one-third of that of the United States, it adds.

Food for thought, I would say. I hope this is not interpreted that many Bahrainis are lazy because this is sure to guarantee an avalanche of sleazy abuse as I have discovered first-hand. "We don't like the message, so let's kill the messenger," seems to be the attitude in this forward-thinking nation.

In all, the private sector will have to produce jobs for the 100,000 Bahrainis entering the labour market over the next 10 years. Throw a few MPs into the picture who will come up with ideas on how such projects could be un-Islamic, and businesses and development come to a standstill. After all, leaving money in a bank vault in Switzerland is much better than creating havoc, riots and rallies in the country - even if it will mean that jobs to feed hungry mouths could also be created. No patriot would allow that or is the gamble worth it?

If the current trend continues (whatever this means), only 800 jobs paying more than BD200 a month are churned out, continues the study.

That is very optimistic, especially when you consider how many thousands graduate from schools, universities and training centres every year.

What will the others do if all those 800 jobs went to Bahrainis that is? Now, I am not good at mathematics but let me see how far this BD200 can go for a Bahraini with dreams and aspirations for a better tomorrow. Will the BD200 be enough to pay for food, rent, car instalments, instalments for that personal loan the bank readily gave you despite not meeting the criteria, clothing, school expenses, health care, etc? You sure don't need a mathematician, a magician would be handy to solve this dilemma.

Not everyone wants to be a doctor - not that doctors are paid enough in Bahrain to begin with. Not everyone wants to continue a university education and not everyone wants to sit at home knitting either.

Every person deserves a decent living but current projections look grim. Without being abusive, I just hope people could be realistic and start at the bottom ranks and make their way upwards. Needless to say, not everyone will make it to the top and the climb, though not scenic all the time, is worth it.

By hard work and persistence, dreams can be achieved. I started with a salary of BD150 and am proud of it. If the clock was turned back, I am sure I would do the same again.



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16/09/2004
Truth is a hard pill to swallow in Bahrain...
Vol XXVII NO. 180 Thursday 16 September 2004

BY AMIRA AL HUSSAINI

I've been threatened, abused and cursed just for saying the truth - that not all Bahrainis want to work.

Yes, I am adamant that many Bahrainis are living in Never Never Land and are finding excuses to remain lazy and live off the hard work of other people - be it mummy and daddy or their older sisters and brothers or inheritance or very soon a social security system which may possibly give them as much as they would get should they "accept" to work for a minimum wage of BD150.

There are many people out there, who are in perfectly good health - regardless of what their mentalities are like - who simply do not want to work.

For them, it is too much to ask them to wake up early in the morning, dress up and drive to work for a job which would give them BD350 a month.

I have heard that over and over again from many Bahrainis, who think they are too precious, smart and god-sent to accept work for such meagre allowances.

They prefer to stay up the whole night counting the stars or doing whatever people with insomnia do and then sleep the whole day in air-conditioned rooms other people pay the electricity bill for.

Even many of those who do turn up at work, feel it is not their duty to do a full day's job. Whatever can wait for tomorrow, can wait forever. The day is also not all work and no play for them as there should be time for a sumptuous breakfast, constant cigarette and coffee breaks, hours surfing the Internet, continuous chatting on the office phone and mobile, running errands for everyone under the sun and then like devout Muslims who have toiled all day and done themselves and their God justice, they turn to Mecca at prayer time and thank Allah for his endless blessings - all in company time.

Maybe I wasn't writing in English in my previous column but nowhere did I say that ALL Bahrainis are like that. I said many. I did not say the majority. I said many. I did not say most. I said many. I hope this emphasises the point I am trying to drive home to people who cannot and will not ever be civilised enough to accept or even try to comprehend an opinion which is in anyway different from theirs.

When I wonder aloud about what this society is coming to, it is not to fill newspaper space. It is also not to hang our dirty underwear out for all to see. The aim is to highlight issues which are of concern to us Bahrainis - I happen to be a Bahraini too - and gauge opinions to collectively study a way of moving forward and changing perceptions and attitudes to make Bahrain what it always was - a beacon for change and development in this part of the world.

We have been the pioneers. We have had the first schools. But it is all in the past. To those still living in 1919, when the first boys school was opened in Muharraq, let's remove those blinkers and go to 2013.

Projections say there will be 100,000 unemployed people in Bahrain. See you then!



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12/09/2004
Bahrainis must abandon their life of idleness
Vol XXVII NO. 176 Sunday 12 September 2004

By AMIRA AL HUSSAINI

Many Bahrainis, even those from modest backgrounds, are behaving as if they were born with a silver spoon in their mouths.

They do not want to study. They demand a job. And they do not want any job. They expect a good office job with a fat pay cheque simply because they are Bahrainis and there are expats filling positions in companies across the board. Those very expats, most of whom are in menial jobs, are filling the shoes of Bahrainis, who are not willing to be garbage collectors, work in retail shops and as mechanics, carpenters, fishermen and plumbers.

Once they 'accept' a job which is suitable to their high level of education - usually something equivalent to a high school certificate if not lower - they do not want to be told how to do the job, because they simply know. They are after all Bahraini and have the right to work in their own country which they know about more than those expats.

At present, 15 per cent of Bahrainis hold jobs that do not match their qualifications. If this isn't horrific, gloomy projections show this figure will leap to 70pc by 2013. Brace yourself. If normal people are complaining today, I don't want to even bring myself to think how bright our tomorrow will be.

Many Bahrainis, if you allow me to be blunt, have no work ethics, no manners and above all, don't think they should wake up early in the morning to make it to work on time.

Many of those 'professionals', do not accept being told to report to work on time, and even when they eventually turn up, they watch the clock and leave at finishing time on the dot - if not before. Here you should also not forget that they are Bahraini and they have another life outside the office.

Unlike expats, who are expected to remain at work at all times because they were brought to Bahrain specifically to work, Bahrainis have extended families, friends and other interests to pursue during and after working hours.

When they do turn up, they are the ones doing their boss a favour. Without them, the institution they work in will not run.

In return, they want to live their lives. They want to have a mobile or two, a luxury car, a nice place to live in, a beautiful wife to show off and a few children into the bargain.

To those dreamers, it is time to wake up and smell the coffee. Hang on to that job and try and improve your skills and attitude at the very least.

Reality in the shape of figures published in black and white yesterday show that unemployment will quadruple in Bahrain by 2013.

The government sector - where bureaucracy reigns - is saturated with Bahrainis. There, 92 per cent of the workers - who don't work - are Bahraini.



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06/09/2004
Terror tag on Muslims reveals bias
Vol XXVII NO. 170 Monday 6 September 2004

By Amira Al Hussaini

I happened to be on a business trip to London as 1,500 children, parents and teachers were held hostage by 'Islamic terrorists' in a school in Beslan in the North Ossetia region in Russia, bordering Chechnya.

On the day I left Bahrain, the newspaper headlines showed a photograph with a line up of bloodied bodies, news of a Nepalese worker beheaded in Iraq and another 11 shot dead, again by people labelled 'Islamic barbarians'.

On the day I left London, the 53-hour school siege had ended with a bloodbath, leaving hundreds of innocent people injured and killed, including, of course, women and children.

Among the so-called terrorists were Arab Muslims, announced reporters covering the ordeal, in a tone which made this vital piece of information more important than the human tragedy which was unfolding by the minute.

At the time of writing this, two French hostages are being held, again by 'Arab Islamic terrorists' in Iraq, in a bid to blackmail the French government to back off on the hijab ban in schools in France.

You should have seen the disgust and horror on the faces of normal everyday people in the UK capital as they watched the television screens beaming to the whole world what Muslim terrorists were doing to innocent beings, who also have the right to live and work and go to school.

Even 'foreigners' who have lived in the Arab world and interacted with the 'Muslim terrorists' day in day out joined the circus, voicing their disgust with the inhumanity and lack of compassion of 'Islamic terrorists'.

At the same time the world's attention was grabbed by how the Muslims were terrorising the rest of the world, Palestinian children were overcoming another type of terror, in their bid to go back to school, but never mind, this will not be reported as people are now immune to the suffering of the Palestinians.

After all, it has been going on for half a decade and the Palestinians should have become used to it too. Parents should have become used to burying their children just as babies should have become used to living without their fathers. Wives should have become used to living without the support of a terrorist husband, whose only dream was to have a home for his wife, parents and children and to put food on the table for them.

The terror the Iraqis are being subjected to daily, is also something they should accept with a pinch of salt because the cluster-bombs which had maimed their children, the desecration of their holy shrines and the civil war situation their whole country has been thrown in, are only a natural price to pay for getting rid of the monstrous Saddam Hussein and the introduction of a free democracy, civil rights and liberties to a people who have been governed by an iron fist for decades.

I am not defending the hostage takers of Iraq or the gunmen who held the Russians at the school. All I am saying is that atrocities are being committed by everyone - Muslims and non-Muslims - and it is the poor unprotected civilians who are caught in the middle.

Double standards also hurt. They hurt more when they are distorted.

Why is the whole world adamant on coining Islam to any terrorist act involving Muslims? Why is Islam blamed for what individuals do?

Why can't we say Catholic Americans are terrorising Muslim Iraqis and Jewish Israelis are butchering Muslim Palestinians?



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