According to a recent Al-Qabas report, Kuwait’s General Directorate of Residency will no longer allow for children's iqamas to be transferred to their mother’s sponsorship in the case of the father’s final exit from Kuwait, the expiry of his residency permit or in the event of his death.

According to the report, the directors of the Residence Affairs Departments in Kuwait’s six governorates received instructions to not accept any applications related to transferring children's residencies to their mothers except in the following cases, where female migrants already have the right to act as sponsors of their children: 

• Female teachers employed by the Ministry of Education;
• Female health care workers employed in the Medical and Nursing Authority of the Ministry of Health;
• Female doctors working in the General Directorate of Criminal Evidence

The Directorate has also ceased allowing the transfer of visit visas to residency dependent visas for children.

This decision comes in the light of Kuwait’s renewed push to “resolve the demographic imbalance”, which has since resulted in a series of knee-jerk decisions recently that seem to scapegoat migrants, and are likely to have negative economic implications.