One-month deadline for employers to return employees’ passports

The Ministry of Labor and Social Development has given employers one-month deadline to return passports to their employees.

The Council of Ministers issued a decision seven years ago abolishing the terms “sponsor” and “sponsored” and replaced them with “employee” and “employer.” It also banned employers from keeping passports of their employees.

The ministry decided in July that employers must return the passports of their non-Saudi employees, failing which they will be fined SR2,000 per employee.

But some employers are still keeping the passports of their employees in contravention of the Cabinet’s decision.

Ministry spokesman Khalid Aba Al-Khail said the ministry has sought to regulate the contractual relationship between an employer and an employee to protect their rights.

The National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) was the first to call for the “abolition of the sponsorship system” in a study submitted in 2010.

The study included alternative proposals to the system of sponsorship and called for streamlining the contractual relationship.

It also recommended that employees need not take the approval of their employers to call their families, or seek their permission to perform Haj. The study also called for canceling any personal responsibility of the employer for the actions of an employee outside the framework of the employment contract.

Secretary General of NSHR Khalid Al-Fakhiri said that holding an employee’s passport is a form of human trafficking.

“What binds the employer and the employee is the contract. The passport is a personal document. No one has the right to take it because it becomes a crime of abuse and denial of rights,” he said.