Tekhaifi, undersecretary of the Ministry of Labor, says there are 1.7 million female Saudi job seekers in the Kingdom. Moreover, his ministry has a list of 330,000 Saudi women who want to work in the private sector. Al-Tekhaifi announced that the ministry has come up with 13 initiatives to help the masses of Saudi females find employment. I say it's time to stop rolling out new initiatives and make some cast iron commitments to find suitable positions for our sisters. Women deserve more from those in positions of authority. They make politically-correct statements during the day and proffer contradictory statements at night. The scruples men face with the emancipation of our graduate women is deeply disorienting. Should she be allowed to work or not? Should she be allowed to go out or is it better for her to stay at home? Should she have been educated at all or is ignorance better for her? Should she cover her face or walk bare-faced? Should she travel with a “mahram” or with a paper? Does she need a guardian or witness to confirm her identity before the authorities or will her identity card suffice? Is she a modified version of the Satan or is she in the form of an angel from God? Should we hide her in her place of work or should we conceal the place of work? Should we open places of work exclusively for women? All these questions seem to ignore the royal directives calling on all to enable women to carry out their role in society, according to the teachings of the Holy Qur'an. Take the royal decision issued in 2003 during the inauguration of the second session of the Shoura Council to open wider horizons for women's work. Then there is the Council of Ministers circular of 2004 that the Ministry of Labor in cooperation with the Ministry of Economy and Planning ought to draw out an integrated national plan for a female workforce. There are also royal directives encouraging women's participation in public life and treating women as equal to men. This is on top of King Abdullah's ever-present call for women to be a central component of the Kingdom's continuous development. Testament to the King's commitment are the scholarships which allow women to study abroad in prestigious universities. The Human Resources Development Fund (HRDF) must attach special importance to training Saudi women and employing them within its plans and programs. Similarly there is the SR2 billion industrial estates development project in Makkah region which could easily employ thousands of Saudi nationals – men and women. We also have the SR27 billion renovation of King Abdul Aziz International Airport and the mega train projects – Saudi women should be trained to front the check-in desks, travel booking kiosks, duty-free shops, car rental counters, luggage offices. Let's forget about the idea of our women being employed as housemaids for the time being – I say Haraam when there are so many professional and commercial opportunities available in the private sector. I also think it is unacceptable that we have a Kingdom filled with expats while so many Saudi women are out of work. We must support our nationals, especially the women who are arguably more serious than the men when it comes to making an honest living. With so many young women graduates the process of Saudization must be ramped up a few notches. The Minister of Labor must act with an iron fist with those companies who are slow to embrace Saudization. Job is a basic right. We must stand together as a nation and do the right thing. __
