Al-Thawry [Archives:2004/743/Press Review]

27 May 2004
Main headlines
– YSP secretary-general receives congratulatory cables on the unity day
– Bomb targeted a local official in Hadramout
– YSP cadres run for students councils elections
– Unions at 6 universities discuss their situations
Columnist Qaed Yousuf says in his article all the people have kept waiting what the government would take of serious steps to increase salaries and wages of the state administrative machinery to encounter the wave of high expenses that included everything related to living conditions. Those bad conditions have driven the majority to poverty.
Between the state of waiting and frustration for non-implementation of the government's promise to improve the living standard of the state employees, came statements of the minister of civil service lately as he announced an increase in salaries of the state employees by a rate ranging between 20-40% of the basic salary.
The strange thing is that he increase came in response to directives by the president of the republic not as a decision taken by the government an came to be as tempting but in reality the increase does not exceed 3000-4000 riyals subject the progressive tax.
In fact one needs a salary equal three times the amount he gets in order to live a decent dignified life as a human being in a democratic country like ours.
The question is whether the ministry of civil service was really in need of presidential directives to increase the civil servants salaries. Was the rise in prices of bread enough to announce a state of emergency inside the government corridors and a cause for reconsidering the policy of wages?
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