The government, which continues to provide jobs to the Omani citizens in the government sector including civil, military and security services, will complete the plans to employ 36,000 Omanis by the end of this year as announced in January. This was stated yesterday by Shaikh Khalid bin Omar al Marhoon, Civil Service Minister, during a press conference at the ministry premises.

“The Ministry of Civil Service, in co-operation with various authorities, supports the employment of nationals in various posts. Through this co-operation we try to provide more job opportunities for the citizens with different qualifications,” he added. Regarding finding practical solutions for issues associated to Grade V of the Civil Service Law, he said: “I want to assure the employees concerned that very soon we will announce a satisfactory solution on the finalisation of the Grade V’s formalities.”

To develop the government services, the ministry will sign a contract with a private consultancy company to conduct a survey on the status of the services. The survey, which will be transparent and independent, aims at identifying the level of services rendered by the government. Meanwhile, on the directives of His Majesty Sultan Qaboos to develop human resources sector, the ministry will organise a symposium on ‘Mechanisms to Develop Governmental Performance’ in September.

The four-day symposium, to be presided over by His Highness Sayyid Haitham bin Tareq al Said, Minister of Heritage and Culture, is scheduled to be held from September 15 to 18 at Al Bustan Palace Hotel. It aims to develop the government employee’s performance and to find more methods and techniques to develop this vital sector. The seminar will focus on three areas namely the governmental performance, the human factor and the enablers to develop the governmental performance in the public and private sectors.

He added that the main responsibility of the ministry is to propose policies and plans that help in developing the administrative units of the government in all legislative and procedural aspects. The minister said: “We are here today to launch the logo and the practical paths for the symposium on the mechanisms to develop the governmental performance. The symposium is very important as it will cast light on the governmental performance, the aspects that contribute to promote this performance in light of the Royal vision of His Majesty to develop this sector."

The government has announced a two-pronged strategy which it hopes will boost employment in the country, as part of its budget. It is hoped that the changes will provide jobs for 36,000 people, mainly in the public sector, and specifically government jobs. The two-pronged strategy includes sensing more people to colleges and universities, as well as offering tailor-made training programs. These plans were released in December, by Khalid bin Hilal al Maawali, Chairman of Majlis Ash’shura and Chairman of the special committee to study the status of the job-seekers.

He said the importance of forming a special committee will assess the real status of job-seekers in the Sultanate, identify the reasons for this and propose proper solutions. He pointed out that this is one of the major problems being faced by many countries in the world in general, and that it needs lot of follow-up, research and finding proper solutions to alleviate its impacts.

He said His Majesty the Sultan’s orders to employ 50,000 citizens has played a major role in alleviating the problems of the job-seekers. While he affirmed the importance of collaboration of all efforts in this direction, he made reference to the efforts made by the private and public sectors in employing Omanis.