Sunday 10 / November / 2024
With the Royal Oman Police tightening the two-year visa ban on expats, it continued to dominate the news agenda this week in Oman.
1) If you leave your job and leave Oman, you won’t be coming back to work for two years ... even if you have a No Objection Certificate (NOC). That was the stark message from a top Royal Oman Police (ROP) official after a number of companies contacted Times of Oman saying the two-year visa ban rules had been tightened.
2) Soon after Times of Oman reporters Fahad Al Ghadani and Rejimon K broke the story on timesofoman.com on Monday night, some of the media reported that company representative could process the papers at the immigration office, but the message again from senior police officials to the Times of Oman was clear. They reiterated that holding a certificate from an ex-employer no longer guarantees being able to work in Oman again within two years of exit. This was the second best read story of the week.
3) Some of the companies also confirmed to timesofoman.com that the No Objection Certificates (NOCs) are being turned down for new jobs in the Sultanate by the Royal Oman Police. This story drove the third most traffic to our site this week.
4) A top official at Oman Chamber of Commerce has said that tightening the two-year visa ban imposed on expats will impact the market. This was the fourth best-read story on our website.
5) Number five spot in most read stories this week was about Oman’s plans to introduce Value Added Tax (VAT) by the middle of next year. With crude prices touching all-time low, economists in Oman and neighbouring countries have been stressing the need for VAT’s implementation to cushion the struggling economies.
