It has not been a year since the beta version of Decree launched, and the website has already grown to become the biggest English language database of Omani legislation available anywhere with a complete title index of all Omani royal decrees and ministerial decisions published in the Official Gazette since 1974 onwards, a full-text catalogue of essentially every single royal decrees issued in the past six years, a collection of over a 150 standalone laws with all their amendments consolidated, the most comprehensive catalogue of Omani treaties available on the internet with over 800 documents, along with a growing collection of the most recent ministerial decisions and regulations issued in the Official Gazette.
Author: Riyadh Al-Balushi
Riyadh is the CEO at Decree. Prior to co-founding Decree, Riyadh worked for over 16 years of as a lawyer for the government of Oman. His areas of subject matter expertise include public international law, technology law, and intellectual property. He holds an LLB from the University of Cardiff, an LLM in IT and Commerce from Southampton University, and a PhD from SOAS, University of London. Riyadh is also a co-founder of Open Data Oman.
Decree Monthly Digest is a summary of the most significant legislation issued in the previous month.
October was a relatively busy month on Decree as ten royal decrees were issued on a variety of topics ranging from the amendment of laws and ratification of treaties, to government restructuring and the approval of petroleum agreements.
The most significant royal decrees issued last month are arguably Royal Decree 68/2022 Amending Some Provisions of the Penal Law, which includes, among other things, the criminalisation of the act of insulting the wife and children of the Sultan, and Royal Decree 69/2022 Amending Some Provisions of the Criminal Procedure Law, which introduces a new procedure for obtaining the approval of the Council of Ministers as a pre-requisite for prosecuting ministers for criminal misconduct. Royal Decree 60/2022 was also a significant royal decree as it transferred the climate affairs competences of the Civil Aviation Authority to the Environment Authority. Other significant royal decrees include Royal Decree 61/2022 on Oman’s accession to the International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism, Royal Decree 66/2022 issuing a licence to Oman Technology Infrastructure Company to build and operate passive infrastructure for telecommunications towers, and Royal Decree 67/2022 approving the petroleum agreement between the Government of the Sultanate of Oman and Shell Integrated Gas Oman BV, Alizz Gas Development LLC, and Totalenergies EP Oman Block 11 SAS for Block 11.
This month also had several important ministerial decisions including Decision 456/2022 of the Tax Authority amending the Executive Regulation of the VAT Law, and Decision 164/202 of the Supreme Judicial Council determining the geographical jurisdiction of the administrative circuits in Muscat, Salalah and Sohar.
Decree Monthly Digest is a summary of the most significant legislation issued in the previous month.
Two royal decrees were issued in September as summarised below:
Licences in the telecom sector are granted by royal decree in accordance with the provisions of the Telecommunications Law. This royal decree granted Oman Towers a licence to build and operate the passive infrastructure of telecommunication towers—which is the first and only licence of its kind granted in Oman.
This royal decree introduced a number of amendments to the Executive Regulations of Royal Decree 5/81 Governing Governing the Usufruct of the Lands of the Sultanate of Oman, the most important of which is increasing the term of the right of usufruct of government land from 50 years to 99 years.
In addition to the royal decrees mentioned above, several ministerial decisions were issued last month, with the following decisions being some of the most significant:
This decision creates a new framework for obtaining permits to provide VoIP and video calling services in Oman, and it imposes a set of new conditions on the providers of such services including a requirement to retain all equipment and data centres physically in Oman.
This decision creates a new framework for granting usufruct right for the construction of private schools that sets maximum areas for the usufruct depending on the school type and the specific periods of usufruct for such uses.
The National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI) published last week the legal framework for the governance of public sector data in the form of a National Data Strategy. Even though the name does not sound like it, the National Data Strategy is a legal instrument equivalent to secondary level legislation exactly identical to a regulation issued by a ministerial decision. This legal instrument governs the whole life cycle of public sector data, provides a framework for the exchange and release of this data, and establishes a system for the designation of national base registries for key public sector datasets, among many other things. This post highlights some of the key concepts found in this strategy.
It has been less than eight months since Decree was launched, and it has already become the definitive source for accessing Omani laws and royal decrees in English. However, even though Decree is the biggest English language index and repository of Omani legislation available anywhere, the reality remains that Decree has only provided access to a portion of Omani legislation, namely, primary legislation in the form of royal decrees and laws.
As our users are fully aware, primary legislation provides only the general legal principles of the law, while the technical details are found in secondary legislation issued through ministerial decisions. These decisions are issued separately from royal decrees and at a later time.
Today, we are taking the first step at addressing this gap in our content by launching a complete English language index of all ministerial decisions published in the Official Gazette from 1972 onwards, which brings up the total of titles found on Decree to over 9,000 royal decrees, ministerial decisions, and treaties.
At this moment, the ministerial decisions section of Decree is merely an index that provides access to the original Arabic version along with a machine translated version generated using Google Translate service. This, of course, is only a temporary situation as we experiment with translating key ministerial decisions as they come out, and hopefully eventually provide a full translation of all new ministerial decisions immediately upon their publication.
You can navigate our ministerial decisions index by browsing the Ministerial Decision Section, by using Decree’s search engine, and by navigating through the tags found under each ministerial decision.
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Decree Monthly Digest – July 2022
Decree Monthly Digest is a summary of the most significant royal decrees and laws issued in the previous month.
Two royal decrees were issued in July as summarised below:
Royal Decree 56/2022 Promulgating the System of the Oman Chamber of Commerce and Industry
OCCI’s new system replaces OCCI’s system of 2017 and introduces a number of changes including a new structure for the OCCI board of directors in which a number of seats is now reserved for elected representatives of companies listed on the Muscat Stock Exchange and one seat is reserved for an elected foreign investor resident in Oman.
Royal Decree 57/2022 Reorganising the Oman Human Rights Commission
This royal decree issued the first comprehensive system for governing the work of the Oman Human Rights Commission, which was established in 2008. The system sets the general framework of how the commission operates and explicitly states that its decisions are made by the majority vote of the representatives of civil society on the commission.
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Decree Monthly Digest – June 2022
Decree Monthly Digest is a summary of the most significant royal decrees and laws issued in the previous month.
The month of June was the busiest month this year so far in terms of royal decrees with 24 royal decrees issued in a single month covering a change in the membership of the Council of Ministers, a restructuring of the judiciary, the promulgation of two new laws, the amendment of three laws, and more. The highlights of these royal decrees are as follows:
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Decree Monthly Digest – May 2022
Decree Monthly Digest is a summary of the most significant royal decrees and laws issued in the previous month.
Six royal decrees were issued in May and none of them related to the promulgation of any new laws. These royal decrees can be summarised as follows:
This decree ratified a new agreement between Oman and the US that grants spouses of embassy staff of one country the right to work in the other country without the need to obtain a work visa or the need to have a sponsor. This is a unique treaty that Oman has not signed with any other country before, but it affects a very small number of people (spouses of embassy staff).
Royal Decree 25/2022 Reinstating Omani Nationality
This royal decree reinstated Omani nationality to a number of individuals in accordance with the provisions of the Omani Nationality Law.
Royal Decree 26/2022 Making Military Promotions and Appointments in the Royal Office and Royal Decree 28/2022 Making Military Promotions and Appointments in the Ministry of Defence
These two royal decrees made a variety of appointments in the Royal Office and the Ministry of Defence, including appointing the president of the newly established Strategic and Defence Studies Academy.
This royal decree established a new government entity, and moved the National Defence College, the Joint Command and Staff College, and the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre from the Ministry of Defence to be under it. This new academy is still subordinate to the Ministry of Defence and has a board of trustees chaired by the Minister of Defence.
This royal decree ratified an agreement between Oman and Iran on maritime transport and it grants shipping companies of either party the rights to national treatment and freedom of transfer of earnings, along with other rights.
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Decree Monthly Digest – April 2022
Decree Monthly Digest is a summary of the most significant royal decrees and laws issued in the previous month.
Ten royal decrees were issued in April and one of them related to the amendment of a law (the Law of the Administrative Court). These royal decrees can be summarised as follows:
The System of the Administrative Apparatus of the State governs at a high level how government entities are created and managed. This royal decree modified this system by introducing provisions that grant the Council of Ministers the power to exempt certain public authorities and establishments from having a board of directors, and also created a mechanism for appointing an accounts auditor for public authorities and establishments.
This royal decree removed NCSI from being under the supervision of the Ministry of Economy and instead made it directly subordinate to the Council of Ministers.
Royal Decree 16/2022 Granting Omani Nationality
This royal decree granted Omani nationality to a number of individuals in accordance with the provisions of the Omani Nationality Law.
Royal Decree 17/2022 Ratifying the Agreement between the Government of the Sultanate of Oman and the Government of the Republic of Chile on the Mutual Visa Exemption for Holders of Diplomatic, Special, Service, and Official Passports and Royal Decree 21/2022 Ratifying the Agreement between the Government of the Sultanate of Oman and the Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh on the Mutual Visa Exemption for Holders of Diplomatic, Special, Service, and Official Passports
These two decrees ratified a visa exemption agreement between Oman and Chile and another one between Oman and Bangladesh. This is a routine agreement that Oman signs with countries from around the world to facilitate the travel of certain classes of diplomats and government officials (i.e. holders of diplomatic, special, and service (mission) passports). Since none of these passports is usually held by ordinary Omani citizens, such agreements do not have a significant impact on the travel of Omani people at large. Read the Law of the Omani Passport to learn more about the different kinds of passports issued by the Omani government.
This royal decree modified the organisational structure of the Ministry of Information. The actual details of the new structure are not yet available as the attachment of the royal decree will only be made public when the Official Gazette is published after the Eid holiday.
Royal Decree 19/2022 Appointing an Undersecretary for the Ministry of Information
This royal decree appointed Mohammed bin Said bin Mohammed Al-Balushi as the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Information. His Excellency Mohammed Al-Balushi was previously the undersecretary of the same ministry for radio and television, and he has now become the only undersecretary in the ministry for all of its functions. We assume that the new structure of the ministry only has one undersecretary and not two.
Royal Decree 20/2022 Extending the Membership of the Members of the Oman Human Rights Commission
The Oman Human Rights Commission is a government entity established in 2007 for monitoring the protection of human rights in the country. The members of the commission are appointed by royal decree from among the members of Majlis Al-Shura, Majlis Oman, OCCI, along with civil societies and members of the public at large for a period of three years for each term. This royal decree extended the membership of the existing members until the end of next year.
This royal decree ratified an amendment to the IAEA Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material. This amendment extends the scope of the original convention to cover the physical protection of nuclear facilities and nuclear material used for peaceful purposes in domestic use, storage, and transport.
Royal Decree 23/2022 Amending Some Provisions of the Law of the Administrative Court
This royal decree made some changes to the Law of the Administrative Court, i.e. the court that has the jurisdiction to hear cases against government administrative decisions and in regard to the implementation of administrative government contracts. The details of the amendments are not yet available as the attachment will only be made public when the Official Gazette is published after the Eid holiday.
There is no law that protects something as poetic as the subject matter protected by intellectual property laws: the human genius. Trade mark law, patent law, and copyright revolve around sophisticated subjects such as distinctness, novelty, and originality as they attempt to protect society’s greatest innovations. From medicines that cure our bodily ailments and spacecraft that explore the galaxy, to music that treats our souls and novels that transport us across both time and space.