KUWAIT: The interior ministry announced on Tuesday that it has busted a domestic helper recruitment office on charges of trafficking in persons and referred those involved to investigation. The ministry said in a statement on its X platform that after thorough investigation by residency detectives, it found that the office in Rumaithiya was recruiting domestic helpers on the names of Kuwaiti citizens and then transferring them to others immediately after arrival, charging between KD 1,200 and KD 1,300 per worker.
The amount far exceeds the official limit on recruitment, the ministry said. Citizens who helped the office recruit the maids were paid KD 50 to KD 100 for each worker. The ministry has referred all those involved in the case to legal authorities for further investigation and legal measures, the statement said.
There are hundreds of domestic labor recruitment offices that bring maids from foreign countries to work for families in the country. Kuwait employs more than 700,000 domestic helpers, a majority of them Asian, who represent over one-fifth of all expatriates living in the country. Meanwhile, the Anti-Corruption Authority (Nazaha) announced on Tuesday it has referred 24 officials to the public prosecution for failing to submit their wealth disclosure statements. NAZAHA said that the officials were supposed to submit their wealth statements by October, but failed to do so.
In the past several months, the authority has referred hundreds of present and former officials to the public prosecution for failing to file their disclosures and on suspicion of graft.
Under the anti-corruption law, all senior government officials including ministers, senior bureaucrats and chairmen and board members of state-owned companies are supposed to reveal their private wealth after taking up their posts and after retiring or resigning.
