‘Salaries received without doing any work’

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KUWAIT CITY, Dec 14: At a time the Council of Ministers instructed the State authorities to implement austerity measures, some of the six maintenance departments under the Maintenance Sector in the Ministry of Public Works have been without contracts or actual work for two years now; while others have been in the same situation for several years, reports Al-Qabas daily quoting sources.

Sources disclosed hundreds of employees including supervisors, a director for management, heads of the supervision and planning departments in each governorate, technicians, engineers and administrators continue to receive their salaries without doing any work. Sources explained this happened after the other State agencies and ministries took over the maintenance of their buildings through a technical body under their wings; particularly the ministries of Health, Awqaf and Education — each of which has an engineering department. Sources said that officials from four of the six maintenance departments replied ‘no’ when the daily asked them if they are currently working on contracts; while one revealed he does not know how to respond to his more than 100 employees every time they ask if they have work to do. The daily obtained information that the number of employees in the departments ranges from 35 to 200 employees and majority of them are nationals who are looking for something to do.

Sources went on to say that the role of some of these departments is currently limited to the maintenance of toilets and repainting of some buildings. Sources added that about five years ago, the ministry proposed the removal of these departments from its organizational structure and then transfer their employees to the Structural Engineering Sector, but it did not push through due to the lack of seriousness in changing the organizational structure of the ministry.

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