Coronavirus: Thousands of migrant workers are threatened to leave the UAE

• Samir Hashemi
• Journalist

Legia and Robert wanted to take a photo of them with their 10-month-old daughter and frame it to reflect the happy times they spent in Dubai.

A professional photographer recorded the moment on a sunny beach, where the famous Burj Al Arab hotel is visible in the background.

Legia and Robert, after spending 10 years in the city where they met and fell in love, and start their family, are preparing to bid farewell to Dubai.

Both of them worked in the travel industry, but they lost their jobs due to the economic consequences of the Coronavirus epidemic.

They were unable to find any new job opportunities, despite their best efforts, and this situation forced them to make a difficult decision to return to their home country – Brazil.

“We always imagined that our daughter would grow up here,” Legia says. “But we have no income. We cannot live here.”

It is a choice faced by tens of thousands of migrant workers across the UAE.

Many of them have spent decades in the country, and with no official way to obtain citizenship or permanent residency, or provide benefits for social welfare to get through tough times, most have no choice but to leave.

The UAE, according to estimates by Oxford Economics, a British-based consulting firm, may lose 900,000 jobs out of a population close to 10 million, meaning that about 10 percent of its population may be displaced from their homes.

The Coronavirus crisis not only affected qualified professionals, but also young workers, who make up the bulk of the workforce.

Last month, Moamen returned from the UAE to Bangladesh, after working in the field of construction for eight years.

The project he was working on was halted in March, when the UAE announced its first death from COVID-19.

After one month, Moamen and his other colleagues were informed that the employer would not be able to pay their salaries but would allow them to continue to live in company-provided rooms in a labor camp until they were able to return home.

“I was the only provider for my family. It is very difficult to find a job here in Bangladesh because of the epidemic,” says Moamen.

The economy in the Emirates

The UAE’s economic model is based on the presence of foreign residents, who currently make up about 90 percent of the population.

Among the seven emirates that make up that Gulf country, Dubai’s economy is highly dependent on sectors based on consumer spending, such as hospitality, luxury retail, education and travel.

Karen Young, a Middle East specialist at the American Enterprise Institute, which is based in the United States, does not expect the situation in the UAE to change soon, as most business surveys show that companies there are not hiring anyone at all, with low levels of employment in general.

“The next nine to 12 months will be a period of decline. And we’ll probably continue to see people leave the country, as there won’t be many new job opportunities,” she says.

And unlike the UAE, a number of Gulf states are encouraging migrant workers to leave.

In July, the Kuwaiti National Assembly approved a bill aimed at reducing their presence by proposing caps for each nationality.

Expatriates make up 70 percent of Kuwait’s population, but the government wants to reduce that percentage to 30 percent.

July also saw the Omani government order state-owned companies to replace Omani citizens to replace foreign employees.

For decades, foreign workers played a major role in building the economies of the Gulf states, providing manpower to key sectors.

The six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which are the UAE, Kuwait and the Sultanate of Oman, along with Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, host a majority of migrant workers living in Arab countries of 23 million, according to ILO estimates. Most of these workers are from Asia.

The International Monetary Fund expects the Middle East region to enter an economic downturn this year, much worse than the global financial crisis in 2008-2009, due to the Corona virus and a record low oil prices.

Some Gulf states are taking advantage of this crisis to reset their economic models by reducing their dependence on foreign labor.

“In countries like Saudi Arabia, Oman and Kuwait, we will see more citizens occupying jobs in the private sector, and this will be a major shift in the social structure that has existed for decades,” Karen Young said.

The UAE, unlike its regional peers, needs to attract expats and tourists to revive local economic growth.

Last month, Dubai took a step towards this goal by announcing a “retiree visa program” for high net worth foreigners over the age of 55. These will be eligible for a five-year visa that is renewable if they meet certain criteria.

This is not an option for Legia at the moment, and the thousands of others who do not fall into this category. But she hopes her family will one day be able to return when the economic environment improves.

“This was our home. I would like to go back,” she says.