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Satyendra Pathak
Doha
Qatari firms can hire 24,000 more skilled and semi-skilled Indonesian workers under a new manpower-quota agreement reached between the two countries, Indonesian Ambassador to Qatar HE Muhammad Basri Sidehabi has said.
Under the agreement, Qatar has agreed to allow up to 70,000 Indonesians to take up jobs in Qatar, Sidehabi told Qatar Tribune on the sidelines of an event organised by the Indonesian Embassy in Doha recently.
Currently around 43,000 Indonesian are working in Qatar, the envoy said, adding that an additional 24,000 will join the workforce in Qatar gradually.
"Out of the 43,000 Indonesians in Qatar currently, a majority of them are domestic helps. As Indonesia has enforced a ban recently on its citizens from working as domestic helps in foreign countries, most of the new recruits will be professionals," the ambassador said.
In a deviation from earlier strategy of hiring mostly domestic staff from Indonesia, the envoy said, the Qatari authorities are now planning to open up more jobs for Indonesian professionals in both private and public sectors.
"A number of engineers, IT professionals, healthcare staff have already approached the Indonesian embassy for jobs in Qatar. The embassy has set up a special cell to help them in getting jobs," the envoy said.
He said unlike other Gulf countries, the situation in Qatar is more favourable for domestic helps.
"There are very few cases of mistreatment of Indonesian domestic staff here. Officials from both the countries are cooperating with each other to sort out such issues," the envoy said.
