KUWAIT: The constitutional court set next Monday to review an objection filed by MP Waleed Al-Tabtabaei regarding the implementation of a ruling by the court declaring a key article of the National Assembly's internal charter as unconstitutional. The court last month ruled that article 16 of the Assembly charter was unconstitutional, which means that the memberships of Tabtabaei and MP Jamaan Al-Harbash are scrapped.

The National Assembly in October voted on the basis of article 16 to retain the membership of the two opposition lawmakers after they received a final jail term for storming the Assembly. Assembly Speaker Marzouq Al-Ghanem had delayed a parliamentary debate on the court ruling last week until after the court issues an opinion regarding the objection. Some opposition MPs have charged that the court ruling represents an interference in the Assembly's affairs and called for legislation to curtail such interference.

On another issue, Ghanem said yesterday that the Assembly's priority issues committee has not been abolished and continues to carry out its work despite appointing a new panel to accelerate the pace of legislation. Ghanem chaired a meeting on Monday of 26 MPs representing heads and rapporteurs of Assembly panels and decided to form a new committee to coordinate to accelerate approving legislation. Ghanem said yesterday the priorities committee will continue to carry out its job and the new panel is not a replacement.

MP Ali Al-Deqbasi yesterday said that the new early retirement law which is being worked out in the Assembly will make available 15,000 jobs for Kuwaitis. The law allows Kuwaiti male and female civil servants to seek retirement ahead of time but without losing most of their pension benefits. The law is the subject of controversy between MPs and the government over its cost to the pension fund. The statements came as new official statistics revealed that the number of unemployed Kuwaitis has reached 15,000. The report said 101,000 foreigners are employed in the government against close to 300,000 Kuwaitis. MPs are pressing the government to replace a majority of expatriate employees in the government with Kuwaitis.

By B Izzak