The Cabinet discussed an ambitious strategy to develop aviation facilities in the Kingdom in two ways. The first is to speed up the development of the current Bahrain International Airport and increase its capacity to 13.5 million passengers a year to serve travel needs and air traffic and the second is the project of a new airport in the future.
The Cabinet decided to commission the Ministry of Transportation to begin to develop the final architectural designs for the expansion and improvement of the current Bahrain International Airport in cooperation with the Ministry of Finance’s allocation of the required funding for the project. Moreover, the Cabinet decided to reserve two locations near Fasht AlJarem and North of Diyar Al Muharraq as potential locations for the new airport and commissioned the Ministerial Committee for Services and Infrastructure to complete the technical and environmental studies related to this in cooperation with the concerned authorities.
His Royal Highness Prime Minister Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa chaired the weekly Cabinet Meeting at the Gudaibiya Palace on Sunday in the presence of His Royal Highness Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Crown Prince, Deputy Supreme Commander and First Deputy Premier.
Dr. Yaser bin Essa Al Naser, Secretary General of the Cabinet, issued a detailed statement on the Cabinet meeting.
HRH the Prime Minister praised the speech delivered by HM King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa during the inauguration of the fourth session of the third legislative term and the national implications conveyed in the speech regarding the continuation of reform, development and improvement towards achieving a better life for every citizen. The Premier expressed gratitude and appreciation to HM’s tribute to the government’s hard work to fulfill the desires of the people for prosperity, maintaining law and order and stability, and to improve the level of services and increase the development rate in all aspects, as well as recognizing what has already been done about implementation and follow-up of the National Assembly’s recommendations. The Prime Minister confirmed that the government is doing everything in its power to deliver the best performance in fulfilling the expectations of HM the King in serving the needs of the people.
The Cabinet discussed the recommendation submitted by the Supreme Council for Women to reconsider the format and raise the reservations of the Kingdom of Bahrain to the convention of the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). The Cabinet reviewed a draft law bill to amend the provisions of the Decree 5/2002 to approve joining the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women by adding a new article that confirms Bahrain’s commitment to implementing Articles 2 and 16 from the Convention, without breaching Islamic provisions and values. The Cabinet decided to refer the draft law bill to the Ministerial Committee for Legal Affairs to reconsider the wording and left the reservations of the Kingdom in line with the recommendations of the National Dialogue on matters related to women.
The Cabinet stressed the importance of maintaining the quality of education in accordance with international criteria and indicators, and for education in both public and private institutions to attain high levels in order to achieve the government’s aims for its educational strategy. The Cabinet commissioned the Development of Education and Training Committee to study the results of the review and follow-up reports prepared by the National Authority for Qualification and Quality Assurance of Education and Training. They approved taking the necessary measures to publish these reports; including 57 Review Reports, 9 Follow-up reports and the National Exams Results for grades 3, 6, 9, and 12. The Cabinet assigned the Minister for Shura and Parliament affairs, and the Chairman of the Board for the National Authority for Qualification and Quality Assurance of Education and Training, to take the necessary measures and procedures.
The Cabinet also discussed the contents of the Supreme Council of the GCC’s decision (in its 33rd session, held on Dec 2nd 2012) to adopt a centralized system for the GCC Statistics Centre to be the exclusive reference for the GCC and the source of all its official statistics.
The Cabinet approved the draft law bill to approve the primary system for the Statistics Center for the GCC and assigned the concerned authorities to take the necessary legal and constitutional measures in preparation to refer it to the legislative authority.
The Government has returned seven draft law bills that were prepared according to suggestions submitted by the House of Representatives to the legislative authority with the government’s opinion attached. The Government approved four of the draft bills and requested reconsideration of three others. The approved draft law bills are as follows: (1) the amendment of some provisions in the Penal Code issued by Decree 15/1976 which incriminate defamation and insults via social media websites; (2) the amendment of Article 393 from the Penal Code issued by Decree 15/1976 to sufficiently reconcile cases of checks drawn on accounts with no balance in front of the Public Prosecution or Court without the need to present an official reconciliation record; (3) the amendment of some of the provisions of law decree 3/1985 regarding control over imported foods, that aim to extend the jurisdictions of this law to all foods, including that which is produced domestically; and (4) a draft law bill amending some provisions of Law 8/2009 on combating smoking and the use of all kinds of tobacco products which aims to decrease the percentage of smokers and address smoking and tobacco related issues.
The other draft law bills that were returned by the government for reconsideration are as follows: (1) a draft law bill to amend Article 409 of the Penal Code issued by Decree 15/1976; (2) a draft law bill on mental health patients’ care; and (3) a draft law bill amending some provisions of the private sector labor law issued by Decree 36/2012.