Kuwait’s education ministry suffers staff shortage after citizens ‘scared’ by workload

Kuwait’s Ministry of Education is being urged to introduce new incentives for technical roles after Kuwaiti employees were reportedly scared off by the workload.

Sources told Kuwait times that a final decision on the incentives offered for roles including psychiatrists and accountants was urgently needed after a staff shortage following a government decision to terminate foreign workers.

The Civil Service Commission (CSC) is enacting a government plan to gradually phase out expats from public sector roles, with plans to lay off more than 44,5000 foreign workers and replace them with citizens in the coming years.

Read: Kuwait plans to ‘cut 1.5 million foreign residents’

The publication said Kuwaitis appointed to replace foreign workers in technical roles at the Ministry of Education were “scared off” by the amount of work in return for what was considered a “low salary”.

“This made 329 out of 379 citizens expected to graduate as social workers and psychiatrists seek out other jobs, leaving only 50 who sought MoE jobs,” a source told the publication.

“MoE used to have over 300 accountants and this number has drastically dropped.”

The sources said they wanted salaries increased for the affected positions to address the problem.