The Maldivian government would prefer to have all expatriate workers employed in government institutions replaced by locals, said Minister of Homeland Security and Technology Ali Ihusan.
The Maldivian government would prefer to have all expatriate workers employed in government institutions replaced by locals, said Minister of Homeland Security and Technology Ali Ihusan.
The Minister’s remarks were in response to a question aimed at him during the ‘Ahaa’ [ask/listen] forum held on Tuesday night. The question aimed to clarify why expatriates are being given opportunities to work in offices that fall within the internal affairs offices and highlighted the issue of foreigners being favoured in some fields over trained locals.
Answering the question, Minister Ihusan said that employing foreigners is not what the government wants, especially in homeland and security related areas.
“The policy of the government is to not have any foreigners working especially in homeland security related areas,” he said.
As such, there will be no foreigners working in official service provision within the Police. However, the Minister highlighted that while there are specially trained medical service related employees and unskilled labourers in the health field, Maldivians are not available as unskilled labourers, despite repeated vacancy announcements.
Adding on, Minister Ihusan said that in order to remedy the situation, salaries will be reviewed to attract locals for such positions.
“We don’t get locals [even] after repeated announcements. We prioritize Maldivians a lot. Even for professional categories, we hire Maldivians as soon as they are available,” he said.
When asked about the salaries of Police, Minister Ihusaan highlighted that there are both uniformed officers and civilian employees in the police force, and that while the two categories of employees provide important services, there are differences.
“For example, when a sworn in police officer has to go out into extreme risk, they are going out to the front lines. That is not there for all our employees,” Minister Ihusaan, who is in charge of the Maldives Police Service said.
Referring to the efforts being made to improve the wages of both categories [uniformed and civilian employees in the police], he said that although attempts are being made to raise the salaries for all, “the state [budget] is empty.”
Therefore, salaries will be reviewed as the government’s income increases, he said, adding that the salaries of civilian employees will be increased in June.
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