Oman to spend billions on jobs

Oman plans to raise the salaries of civil servants and spend $2.6 billion on creating jobs and state aid reported the Associated Press on Sunday.
The announcement of the spending boost comes after two months of sporadic protests by demonstrators asking for more jobs and greater representation in government.

On Saturday, the country’s ruler, Sultan Qaboos bin Said, promised pay raises and benefits for 120,000 civil servants and pensioners, according to a report in Times of Oman.

In March, the Sultan had ceded to demands of protestors asking for a raise in salary by increasing the living allowance of government employees by 100 Omani rials ($260). He also increased the pension of civil servants by 50 percent.
“My pension is now 154 rials more than it was before, a rise of 40 percent,” Ahmed Al Jahdhami, a retiree based in Muscat, told the newspaper. “I used to get 512 rials and now I get 666 rials, thanks to the royal grant.”