ShareMP: Expats give meds as gifts - Iqama issuance to go online - 2 MPs file to grill Roudhan
KUWAIT: The National Assembly yesterday overwhelmingly approved in two rounds of voting a draft law requiring foreigners visiting Kuwait to obtain a health insurance policy for the duration of the visit. The law, passed by 47 MPs against four with one abstention, also forbids the interior ministry from issuing visit visas for foreigners without seeing the health insurance policy.
The law stipulates no specific amounts to be paid by the visitors, but this is expected to be defined when the ministry prepares the bylaws for the application of the law following its publication in the official gazette within one month of reaching the government. Accordingly, the law's implementation is unlikely to happen before two to three months or even longer.
The legislation main aim is to prevent foreign visitors from undergoing medical treatment at the country's public health facilities, although existing laws already ban them as the health service is provided through a civil ID which is granted only to those who have legal residence permits. The law is the latest in a raft of measures that authorities have taken to tax expatriates following a plunge in oil prices in mid-2014. The measures have largely spared citizens.
These measures include sharply increasing health charges, raising electricity tariffs by 150 percent and raising fuel prices, as the government prepares to increase a series of other charges including residency fees. During the debate, the majority of MPs gave unlimited support for the government to impose such charges on expatriates, with some alleging that expats in the country take government medicines to their home countries.
MP Safa Al-Hashem said that in 2018, as many as 621,000 foreigners came to Kuwait as visitors, who "underwent medical treatment and left" without paying charges. She opposed any exemptions in the law. MP Yousef Al-Fadhalah said expatriates take government medicines as gifts for their relatives in their home countries and some are sold in pharmacies there. MP Khalil Al-Saleh said the measure will provide a new financial resource for the budget, but MP Adnan Abdulsamad said this is untrue because the ministry has failed to collect its insurance money from private insurance companies.
MP Abdulwahab Al-Babtain said the number of beds at public hospitals is not sufficient for Kuwaitis and expatriates, while MP Adel Al-Damkhi said visit visas had been misused by expats to come to Kuwait for free medical treatment. Health Minister Sheikh Basel Al-Sabah said the insurance will cover emergency and necessary surgeries only. He added that to resolve the problem of payment of health insurance by expatriates, the ministry has begun receiving payments online, saying that in the last month, the ministry received KD 3.9 million.
Interior Minister Sheikh Khaled Al-Jarrah Al-Sabah told the Assembly yesterday that the ministry will start granting residence permits online to domestic helpers from next week. He said the measure will be applied to other categories in the near future.
Meanwhile, opposition MPs Al-Humaidi Al-Subaei and Mubarak Al-Hajraf yesterday filed to grill Commerce and Industry Minister Khaled Al-Roudhan over allegations of financial and administrative violations. They said in the grilling that they had repeatedly warned the minister against the violations, but he made no effort to stop them, and in fact such violations increased. Assembly Speaker Marzouq Al-Ghanem said the grilling will be placed on the agenda of the March 19 session and there is a possibility it could be debated depending on the minister and the Assembly.
The grilling accuses the minister of violating the law and committing financial violations against public funds, in addition to a lack of any supervision in the ministry. The grilling also alleges that the minister allowed favoritism and influence to dictate policies and employment decisions in the ministry and other agencies under the minister. The grilling also alleges financial and administrative violations at the Public Authority for Industry and the National Fund for Small and Medium Enterprises. The minister is also accused of squandering public funds and hiding key documents from the Audit Bureau.
By B Izzak
