Saudi Gazette report

THE random rise of industrial workshops with an accumulation of vehicles abandoned for months and years on end in several neighborhoods of Makkah including Kaakiya, Aziziyah and Haj Street has disconcerted the residents of the holy city for long.

People are complaining about a lack of commitment on the part of workshop owners to repair damaged vehicles on time. The workshops leave vehicles for repair on roadsides, impeding movement and sometimes encroaching into unauthorized areas, they say. It is alleged that many of these workshops break the law by expanding their operations into activities that are not allowed by their operational permits.

Speaking to Al-Madina newspaper, a head mechanic said the industrial zone is full of chaos and people do not know who to report these violations to.

Residents Mohammed Al-Harbi and Fahad Al-Nashiri said many car repair workshops do business in violation of conditions stipulated in licenses granted to them. As a result, many of them cause damage to vehicles. They pointed out that the reason for the spread of these illegal activities is the lack of follow-up and monitoring by the authorities to make sure these workshops comply with the regulations and the terms of licensing agreements.

Nasser Al-Zahrani said many workshops in the industrial city do not comply with the dictates of the license agreement. He noted that the level of cleanliness is low and the number of containers that the workshop owners are supposed to provide is very small compared to the volume of garbage.

Essam Turki Khalifa, head of a mechanics' guild in Makkah, explained that at least 20 cases are transferred to his office by the police every month and most of these cases are resolved amicably. There is no system of penalties against the owners of violating workshops.

Khalifa admitted that many workshops were operating in an illegal manner. He pointed out that these institutions were supposed to give young Saudi graduates of technical and vocational institutes training and employment opportunities but in reality they do not.

Osama Bin Abdullah Al-Zaytouni, director of media relations in Makkah Municipality, has said the municipality pays great attention to workshops and industrial zones in Makkah through regular monitoring of these sites. The municipality carries out periodic inspection campaigns utilizing its resources to full capacity.

About abandoned cars, he said there are intensive campaigns to remove these cars from the streets.

The head of traffic safety and spokesman for the holy city's Traffic Department, Col. Fawzi Al-Ansari said they follow up to ensure that all regulations are set in place and implemented. He said any violators would be punished in accordance to legal procedures.

Meanwhile, the residents of Makkah have called upon the municipality to relocate about 50 car junkyards near the Haj Street and the Maqrah area saying that these sites are a threat not only to their health but also to the environment.

Responding to citizens’ complaints, the municipality said it has completed 50 percent of the industrial city in Oukashiya exclusively for car workshops.

The new industrial city, which covers an area of 4 million sq. meters and is expected to cost SR2 billion, will focus on all activities related to motor vehicles.

Citizens insisted that any delay in shifting the car junkyards from residential areas to Oukashiya would threaten the health of the people living in the area whose population is constantly growing.

Mohammed Al-Zahrani, Faisal Al-Saedi, Abdullah Al-Otaibi and Mufreh Al-Qurashi, all of them residents of Maqrah, have agreed that the junkyards must be shifted quickly. “We cannot wait anymore for the shifting of these junkyards to a remote location far away from residential districts,” said Al-Zahrani while speaking to Al-Madina.

“There are houses, playgrounds and shops near the junkyards and the municipality should shift them to another place to protect the health of the citizens,” said Al-Saedi.

Al-Otaibi said the municipality had promised to shift the junkyards to a location south of Makkah and stopped renewing the junkyards’ licenses. “What we want today is to speed up the process,” he added.

Zaytouni confirmed that 50 percent of the new industrial city had been completed. “It is the place allocated for all car-related activities including junkyards, showrooms and spare parts,” he pointed out.

The new city will also accommodate maintenance workshops for painting and repair works, as well as shops for accessories, logistics and public services. It will serve customers from the entire region, the spokesman said.

He said the municipality was coordinating with the Civil Defense to make sure that none of the present car workshops and junkyards operated without license.

Regarding the issue of cleaning, Zaytouni said the municipality deployed a large number of workers to ensure cleanliness of residential areas in the Haj Street and Maqrah.

“We’ll ask workshops and junkyards to sign contracts with cleaning companies to remove debris to dumping areas on a daily basis. We’ll not give any license to workshops without producing contracts signed with cleaning companies,” Zaytouni told Al-Madina.

Ghazi Juwaiber, chief of junkyard owners in Makkah, said most of the old junkyards in Makkah and Jamoom were licensed. “There are many unlicensed junkyards, however,” he said, adding that the shifting of junkyards to a new place would not serve the interests of investors.

The largest number of car junkyards is located in Maqrah and it will be difficult to convince investors to shift their businesses to the new industrial city. “It requires solutions that take the investors’ rights into account,” Juwaiber said.