Officials in labour recruitment offices have revealed that the General Directorate of Border, Passports and Expatriate Affairs has started procedures for granting visas to domestic workers from the Philippines, local Arabic daily Arrayah has reported.
They said the decision was taken after the issue of visas for Indonesian and Ethiopian housemaids was stopped, according to the daily.
The officials pointed out that a decision of the Indonesian embassy to stop recruitment of housemaids from the country had led to an increase in recruitment rates. The directorate of passports had, in the meanwhile, stopped issuing visas to Ethiopian housemaids, the report quoted the officials as saying.
The officials expected that the decision to start procedures for recruitment of Filipino housemaids would help decrease the number of complaints over delays in hiring domestic workers and might bring down recruitment rates, according to the report.
Qatari nationals have accused recruitment offices of “manipulating” rates, saying that the cost of hiring an Indonesian housemaid was QR15,000, housemaids from Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Nepal QR12,000 and Ghana, Ethiopia and Kenya QR9,000, says the report.
The citizens stressed the importance of introducing amendments to the labour law which would protect sponsors from the consequences of housemaids escaping after the end of the guarantee period.