My good friend Rashed Al-Fawzan is an expert in economic changes. He always has sound advice at times of economic crisis. As the cost of living has increased dramatically, Al-Fawzan has called the government to allow public sector employees to work in free businesses to increase their income. The vast majority of government employees have no additional income, and their income mainly goes to paying bills and other installments. A government employee does not receive a housing allowance or medical insurance. Lately, the salaries of government employees were cut and therefore the employee is in need of additional income.
His call for government employees to work in additional jobs goes against the rules of the Ministry of Civil Services that states a government employee cannot hold two jobs at the same time. However, reality shows that many of them are working secretly and operating undercover businesses. Some believe that allowing government employees to work in additional jobs will limit the chances of unemployed Saudis finding jobs.
Saudis searching for jobs are often pushed to work in free businesses, buying and selling. Instead of helping these Saudis, we see businessmen taking advantage of their need to start their own small businesses and put obstacles in their way. I have a perfect example of such a market, and I wish those who have the power to stop such exploitation do something to stop it.
The Friday market is located in Jeddah downtown in the historical area. The authorities take advantage of the ambition of Saudis to start their own free business and charge them SR600 for Thursday and Friday only, which is an average of SR2,400 a month for eight days only. How could a Saudi who wants to start his own business out of nothing afford such an amount and what kind of product or services he is selling that can earn him SR300 per day?
This is evident as the management of this market told young Saudis that the daily charge would increase to SR450 for ten days. They took advantage of the upcoming school vacation and the management had a condition that the amount is paid in advance. When asked why these expenses are increasing, the answer was that it was specified by the governorate to cover expenses.
Why do Saudi youth have to bear these expenses? They only have their stalls and the products and their transactions may not bring the capital amount invested. And in good cases, the profit earned may be small. There are three departments surrounding these stalls; the governorate, which is behind increasing the charges as said, the operating company, and last are businessmen who can pay the charges for these stalls, which means that they can rent many of them, giving no chance to ambitious Saudis. Who will save these youth who are searching for a little profit?
