KUWAIT: All facilities receiving extra subsidies as per the Cabinet decision number 654 issued on May 18, 2020 are fully mandated to pay the past and future salaries of Kuwaitis registered in their files, and not lay off any of them until June 30, 2021, Al-Rai reported quoting a senior Public Authority of Manpower official.

"The sums spent on extra subsidies for those companies came to protect the rights of national workers in the private sector and provide job security for them, as it is their right to get full salaries according to the contracts signed between them and the private sector companies they work for," the authority's official spokesperson and public relations manager Aseel Al-Mazyad added, noting that if any of those companies had deducted Kuwaiti workers' salaries during the coronavirus crisis and had applied for extra subsidies and received them, they will be obliged to deposit all deducted sums in those employees' bank accounts before Sept 15.

"Kuwaitis working in the private sector are entitled to full salaries in addition to national labor support monthly paid by the manpower authority as an incentive. The extra subsidies were paid to the companies to make up for the sums deducted from citizens' salaries," Mazyad stressed, pointing out that the manpower authority had deposited the June, July and August extra subsidies in employers' bank accounts last Wednesday and the remaining three months' subsidies will be monthly paid until November.

Finally, Mazyad stressed that the manpower authority will check with local banks and financial establishments to verify whether the concerned companies have deposited Kuwaiti employees' salaries. For non-complying companies, the fourth payment (for September) will be suspended and the first three months' payments will be considered as debts.