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Wednesday, August 12, 2020

Expat Exodus In The Middle East

This article is by
Vanshita Banuana
Vanshita Banuana
MENA

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Article Contributor(s)

Vanshita Banuana

Article Title

Expat Exodus In The Middle East

Publisher

Global Views 360

Publication Date

August 12, 2020

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A photograph of Dubai

A photograph of Dubai | Source: Fredrik Öhlander via Unsplash

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit people and economies worldwide, sparking a global recession and financially destabilising millions of people. In the Middle East, dipping oil prices have only worsened the threat to the economy. Businesses are shutting down, and many are trying to survive by cutting the salaries or laying off of workers. Large segments of the workers in these countries are expatriates, and many have struggled to make ends meet as unemployment soared.

The development of the Gulf countries has always been intertwined with their large expat populations. These workers are often vital to the economy, not just as part of the workforce but also as consumers by enabling successful malls, restaurants and other forms of recreation and tourism. Countries like Saudi Arabia gain valuable non-oil revenue in the form of increased Value Added Taxes (VAT) and by imposing a monthly fee on migrants who want to sponsor family members.

Many of these workers are from developing Southeast Asian countries such as India and Pakistan, and contribute greatly to their home country’s economy in the form of remittances, i.e sending money back home. Those who are facing unemployment or salary cuts are eager to be repatriated, especially since in many Gulf countries visas, rent, and even phone lines are linked to jobs, and expats have little to no social safety nets to fall back on.

“Panicked” Indians applying to go back home crashed the Dubai aviation ministry’s website for applications in the process. The consulate says it has received around 200,000 applications for repatriation of expats from as many as 12 countries.

For some, closing businesses are forcing them to go home. For others, the cost of education is the major concern. The Emirates group, Uber’s Middle Eastern counterpart Careem, and hotels are some of the few major employers considering laying off large portions of their staff or reducing salaries.

Dubai has been one of the hardest hit, as expats form an estimated 92% of the population. Dubai based movers estimate that they’re getting up to seven calls a day to ship belongings abroad. It is extremely hard to gain permanent resident status in countries such as the UAE, and the costs of living and education are quite high and often provided by employers, which has made leaving the only option left for many laid-off workers across all fields.

The UAE has tried to offset the damage by granting automatic extensions to expiring work permits, waiving of work permit fees and fines, and providing interest-free loans and repayment breaks.

Meanwhile, governments in Kuwait and Oman are trying to mould the exodus into an opportunity to boost local employment. On the other hand, the Saudi Arabian government has been criticised for not taking enough measures to protect the local workforce.

While the Gulf countries have been trying to decrease their dependence on oil wealth and foreign workforce, it is not something that can be accomplished soon, especially given the great dependence of the Gulf economies on both those factors.

There is still too unavoidable a gap between the current skill of local workers and the training needed to compete with foreign professionals, making it hard to simply employ domestic workers in place of foreign ones. The pandemic, however, might not leave much of a choice.

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February 4, 2021 4:38 PM

Black Lives Matter: Trump, Antifa, and the Anti-Racist movement

As massive protests following the passing of George Floyd kept on shaking the United States. President Donald Trump tweeted on 31st of May that far-left group Antifa was the one behind the violent riots and he would designate it as a terrorist group. He said, “The United States of America will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization.” This assertion was repeated by the US Attorney General William Barr as well.

Antifa, short for anti-fascists, is an amorphous movement and not an organization as Trump labels it to be. They tend to be on the left of the U.S. political spectrum, many describing themselves as socialists, anarchists, anti-capitalists or communists. Antifa, according to many commentators, is just a decentralized collection of individual activists who mostly use non-violent methods to achieve their goal, which is to resist the spread of fascism. They track people who spread racist hatred and fascist ideology through on-ground events, traditional media, or social media and use cultural forms of art like drawing, music, film screenings etc. to spread the message of inclusivity. There are more militant anti-fascist groups as well, who mostly engage in non-militant activities but are willing to use more confrontational tactics at times as well. 

This is not the first time that Donald Trump has criticized Antifa to shift the focus away from racial discrimination faced by the black community in USA. In this instance as well President has tried to portray the protestors and looters with a vague phrase “radical-left bad people” and invoking “Antifa” to represent the whole of leftist militant groups which are bound more by belief than by any organizational structure.

Taking a cue from President Trump, many officials, conservative commentators and white supremacists started blaming Antifa for using the “Black Life Matters” movement to indulge in violence and undermining the government of the USA. Mr Trump’s national security adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, had also blamed such activists during his appearances on CNN and A.B.C. News. Mr O’Brien said the F.B.I. needed to “come up with a plan” to deal with Antifa. John Guandolo, who was in the FBI for 13 years, went a step ahead and claimed that Antifa and “Black Life Matters” are communist organizations, who are planning to overthrow the US government. He also praised President Trump for calling Antifa a terrorist organization and lamented that the FBI are unaware of its plan. Fiona Moriarty-McLaughlin, a journalist at the right-wing publication Washington Examiner, re-posted a video purportedly depicting "Paid #Antifa thugs" vandalizing the store — even though there is no evidence to suggest that the vandals were members of the movement.

The FBI and local law enforcement agencies have aggressively pursued charges against rioters, looters and others accused of havoc. However there is no evidence of any involvement of organized violence by Antifa or any other left-wing group. The most serious case that has emerged in federal court involved three men in Nevada linked to a loose, national network of far-right extremists advocating the overthrow of the U.S. government. They were arrested on May 30 on charges of trying to foment violence during Black Lives Matter protests. There are many instances when white thugs were seen vandalizing which blacks feared could be used against them.

The invocation of Antifa by President Trump during the “Black Life Matters” protest is conveniently used by the conservative commentators and white supremacists to somehow shift the focus away from the deep rooted racism in the USA to the violent actions by some protesters during the “Black Life Matter” protest.

As massive protests following the passing of George Floyd kept on shaking the United States. President Donald Trump tweeted on 31st of May that far-left group Antifa was the one behind the violent riots and he would designate it as a terrorist group. He said, “The United States of America will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization.” This assertion was repeated by the US Attorney General William Barr as well.

Antifa, short for anti-fascists, is an amorphous movement and not an organization as Trump labels it to be. They tend to be on the left of the U.S. political spectrum, many describing themselves as socialists, anarchists, anti-capitalists or communists. Antifa, according to many commentators, is just a decentralized collection of individual activists who mostly use non-violent methods to achieve their goal, which is to resist the spread of fascism. They track people who spread racist hatred and fascist ideology through on-ground events, traditional media, or social media and use cultural forms of art like drawing, music, film screenings etc. to spread the message of exclusivity. There are more militant anti-fascist groups as well, who mostly engage in non-militant activities but are willing to use more confrontational tactics at times as well. 

This is not the first time that Donald Trump has criticized Antifa to shift the focus away from racial discrimination faced by the black community in USA. In this instance as well President has tried to portray the protestors and looters with a vague phrase “radical-left bad people” and invoking “Antifa” to represent the whole of leftist militant groups which are bound more by belief than by any organizational structure.

Taking a cue from President Trump, many officials, conservative commentators and white supremacists started blaming Antifa for using the “Black Life Matters” movement to indulge in violence and undermining the government of the USA. Mr Trump’s national security adviser, Robert C. O’Brien, had also blamed such activists during his appearances on CNN and A.B.C. News. Mr O’Brien said the F.B.I. needed to “come up with a plan” to deal with Antifa. John Guandolo, who was in the FBI for 13 years, went a step ahead and claimed that Antifa and “Black Life Matters” are communist organizations, who are planning to overthrow the US government. He also praised President Trump for calling Antifa a terrorist organization and lamented that the FBI are unaware of its plan. Fiona Moriarty-McLaughlin, a journalist at the right-wing publication Washington Examiner, re-posted a video purportedly depicting "Paid #Antifa thugs" vandalizing the store — even though there is no evidence to suggest that the vandals were members of the movement.

The FBI and local law enforcement agencies have aggressively pursued charges against rioters, looters and others accused of havoc. However there is no evidence of any involvement of organized violence by Antifa or any other left-wing group. The most serious case that has emerged in federal court involved three men in Nevada linked to a loose, national network of far-right extremists advocating the overthrow of the U.S. government. They were arrested on May 30 on charges of trying to foment violence during Black Lives Matter protests. There are many instances when white thugs were seen vandalizing which blacks feared could be used against them.

The invocation of Antifa by President Trump during the “Black Life Matters” protest is conveniently used by the conservative commentators and white supremacists to somehow shift the focus away from the deep rooted racism in the USA to the violent actions by some protesters during the “Black Life Matter” protest.

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