Security

No…Not my security!  I’ve noticed a variation in the physical security measure on residential property.  Those locals who own their own house usually have a high wall or an  exterior wall of the house on the boundary with the road or footpath.  There is no front garden as you would expect to see in the west.  Actually they look slightly similar to a row of Victorian terraced houses without the front windows.  There will be a solid external door with an intercom system to contact the occupants.  There are NO letterboxes.  But then I can’t recall seeing a postman.  Actually none of the houses have a street number.  I assume this means there is no postal service? 

The majority of Saudi’s live in apartment buildings which are usually two or three storey.  Sometimes the ground floor is occupied by shops or commercial operations.  You may now have deduced the average Saudi isn’t wealthy.  Basics are either free (eg, healthcare and accommodation) or subsidised (eg, essential food).  For example, I purchased 15 eggs on Saturday for 50p.  Flour (bread) is also very cheap.  It only starts getting expensive when you purchase imported food.

But I’ve digressed from the topic.  In contrast to the more modern apartment buildings, many of the very old apartment buildings do not have bars over the windows.  The most recent apartments have bars on both the windows and over the window mounted air-conditioning units.  Apparently when you rent an apartment it doesn’t usually come with air-conditioning and you have to fit your own.  All this security surprised me because this is a culture where theft isn’t supposed to be prevalent and the punishment (3rd offence) can result in the amputation of the right hand.  Removal of the right can can frequently result in the offender starving to death.  The right hand is used to eat from the communal food bowl and the left is used for other purposes because there is no toilet paper (which is possibility why it’s so expensive here!).

Can you see the grills on the windows and over the air-conditioning units?

I’m digressing again.  About 12 months ago the Saudi government introduced a policy of forced removal of illegal workers.  Apparently there were approximately 2 million of them in the kingdom.  Why so many illegal workers?  Well as far as I can establish the government wanted Saudi’s to do the work and introduced a policy where every employer had to ensure a percentage of their workforce was Saudi.  Saudi’s are expensive to employ and not very productive.  This resulted in some wealthy Saudi’s creating “shell companies” which then obtained visas for cheap foreign labour.  These companies became cheap labour hire companies.  This drove down the price of labour to a very low level.  One result was it made the cost of construction very cheap.  However the workers were so poorly paid and exploited that a number of them turned to crime to supplement their meagre income.  Burglary and theft of air-conditioning units was one option.

My guess is this is why almost all the apartment blocks have bars on the windows and grills over the air-conditioning units.

The illegal workers were told to depart or else face prison.  May of them faced a dilemma as their employer held their passport and they might be owned wages months in arrears.  Eventually, with the assistance of their embassy and some support from the government they all departed.  With a shortage of skilled workers the price of construction has sky-rocketed.  This is why there are so many vacant and half-built construction sites across the kingdom.  Ordinarily the situation would correct itself with the introduction of new “Legal” workers on a higher rate of pay and with better conditions of employment.  However this hasn’t occurred because the government “Saudization” policy is still in force.  The government doesn’t want foreign workers to do the work (and send their wages offshore) when they have 30% unemployment amongst their own nationals. But the unemployed have two problems.  They are unskilled; and to a lesser extent; unwilling to do manual labour.  The government solution is to build training academies where the locals will be taught how to do the work.  But who is going to build the academies.  The country has a chicken and egg situation!