Foreign workers being recruited to Qatar would be able to complete all the formalities for obtaining a residence permit on arrival at the airport, according to a senior official of the Ministry of Interior.
The Ministry is currently working on a project to provide all such services at the New Doha International Airport, which is expected to be ready by the end of next year.
The services will include finger printing, medical check up and issuance of residence permits, an official at the Department of Borders, Passports and Expatriate Affairs at the Ministry told a seminar here on Monday.
Once the project becomes a reality, foreign workers would be able to obtain their residence permit and ID card before getting out of the airport, a local Arabic daily quoted the official as saying. Further details were not given.
Currently, the entire procedure for obtaining a residence permit would take several weeks, since the new recruits are required to go to different facilities to complete the formalities.
The official said there was also a proposal to set up service outlets of the Ministry at the premises of some big companies for the benefit of their workers.
The Ministry has already embarked on an ambitious project to offer different services under one roof. More such unified facilities would be opened in different parts of the country, including Mesaieed, Dukhan and Al Rayyan. The locations will be selected based on the density of the population, said the official. Two new service centres had been opened in Al Daain and Umm Salal late last year.
The Ministry is also planning to expand the e-government services cover more transactions. The number of companies using the e-government service has increased manifold over the past two years reaching 14,803 compared to just 289 in 2009.
The Department has already introduced a new service called Al Mukhallas that enables customers to complete all transactions online on behalf of individuals, companies and establishments upon authorisation. The Department is preparing the draft of the executive regulations for law No: 4 of 2009 organising exit and entry of foreigners and their sponsorship.
The eye- print technique was approved to be implemented at the ports of entry but it is still under experiment. Once introduced, It will speed up the procedures for entry and exit.
The Peninsula
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