Six new workers' cities and twelve housing complexes are planned to be built in Kuwait to accommodate around 400,000 workers over the next six years. This is part of a long-term plan to ease housing problems and manage the growing number of workers in the country.
Meanwhile, the Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh area is facing several urgent challenges, prompting the municipality to act quickly. Since long-term solutions may take between two to six years, the authorities are working on short-term steps to control the current situation and prevent it from worsening.
An informed source told Al-Rai that the municipality has done a detailed study of the area and proposed a set of practical solutions. These include changes in laws, new regulations, and better organization to help the municipality enforce its responsibilities more effectively. One of the major proposals is to ban bachelors from living in certain residential areas. A draft law is being prepared to support this, which will allow the municipality to evict violators and cut electricity and water to non-complying properties. There is also a plan to amend the Municipal Law No. 33 of 2016 to help issue immediate fines and force property owners or contractors to fix violations within six months.
On the organizational front, the plan includes building six workers' cities and twelve housing complexes to house around 400,000 workers. These long-term projects will take time, so in the meantime, the municipality is focusing on seven urgent actions.
The short-term solutions include not allowing residential units to be rented for non-family use, and permitting workers’ housing to be built in industrial areas, agricultural lands, and within major projects. These steps aim to reduce the number of bachelors in certain areas, control security concerns, and reduce the high population density.
Additionally, the municipality plans to give violating properties a grace period to correct their status after updating ownership data. They also aim to connect workers directly to the sites of the projects they work on, whether government or private, with the help of the Public Authority for Manpower. Lastly, efforts will be made to fix parts of the area's badly affected infrastructure.
These urgent steps are expected to ease the current pressure in Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh while the long-term plans are being carried out.