Kuwait expects 1.5 million expats to leave this year

The economic slowdown due to the coronavirus pandemic has forced companies to cut their workforce to save on costs and remain afloat. Almost 1.5 million expatriate workers are expected to leave Kuwait by year’s end.

Similarly, the government’s decision to lower the number of expats living in the country, through a new residency law, and its continuing Kuwaitization of jobs in the public sector also hit migrant workers.

The draft of Kuwait’s new residency law would limit the number of foreign nationals recruited by companies each year and will include regulations based on their skills, Interior Minister Anas Al-Saleh was earlier reported as saying.

Over 158,000 expat workers have already left the country only in a span of 116 days, or from March 16 until July 9, many of whom have been laid off because of the coronavirus crisis, local newspaper Arab Times reported.

The Indian and Egyptian expats communities were hit the hardest, the report said.