Khalaf Al-Harbi Okaz newspaper About two weeks ago, I could not enter the foreign terminal at King Khaled International Airport in Riyadh as queues of passengers had stretched into the middle of the road. I felt for a moment that I was at an airport in Dhaka or Karachi because most of the passengers were ordinary Asian workers. In the midst of this chaotic scene, I did witness two or three passengers with the traditional Saudi headdress. Like me, those wearing the Shemagh were looking for a way to get to the door. Inside the lounge, the situation was even more suffocating. Because I wore a Shemagh, I managed to reach the waiting lounge swifter than I had expected. While waiting to board the plane, I walked to the corner where local newspapers were available — with a fear that the language of these newspapers could be Urdu or Bengali. Anyhow, the point is I took one newspaper and sat down reading quietly until I came across a report about a string of violations registered by the National Anti-Corruption Commission against King Saud Hospital in Onaizah. There were various violations detected, such as holding cocktail parties, mismanagement and bureaucratic negligence. There was one particular violation that caught my attention — patients suffering from a lack of doctors. There were only five consultants and two specialists and that resulted in waiting times of up to 25 days for an appointment. The report mentioned that these jobs have remained vacant for a long time. This exciting line took me on a stroll down memory lane for a moment before my mind returned to the airport and the chaotic scene created by those people from the Subcontinent. I put the newspaper aside and checked my e-mail. I remembered that I had received this mail that morning from a consultant doctor. The letter says: “Very briefly, I am a doctor at the Ministry of Health. Like me, there are so many doctors who have obtained fellowships in various disciplines and classified professionally by the Saudi Commission for Health Specialties as qualified consultants. “But unfortunately, we suffer from a lack of consultant jobs. Here, the reason for not appointing us is the absence of consultant vacancies even though we are doing the duty of consultants. Some of us are still working on the salary of a specialist.” Here the contradiction is that doctors are being hired from outside the country as consultants and they receive the salaries of consultants even if they work as specialists. Let me offer some explanation. If a Saudi doctor secured a fellowship, has the required experience to become a consultant and submits an application to get promoted to this level, that application would remain in a long waiting list. It may take several years to get him the post after his turn actually comes. However, in the case of a foreign doctor, there is no need for such a long waiting time. My question – for which I did not find an answer – is why are Saudi doctors not treated like their foreign counterparts. Unfortunately, this often leads to an outflow of efficient doctors to join the private sector in pursuit of parity in pay. I finished reading the letter and went to board the aircraft after realizing the reason why those who wear Shemagh have become a rare and endangered group. If a Saudi consultant physician cannot find a job easily even though patients are in need of him, how can a modest Saudi craftsman get a job in the midst of the turbulent sea of Asian craftsmen who are too many and exceeding our needs and those of our neighboring countries as well?
