Aisha Jamal Saudi Gazette JEDDAH — The Third Administrative Circuit at the Administrative Court here looking into the flood disaster case found a senior mayoralty official guilty of accepting bribe, responding to mediation (wasta) and wasting public funds. The official, former director of rain projects, was sentenced to five-year imprisonment and a fine of SR100,000. The accused objected to the verdict, considered preliminary, during the court proceedings on Monday. The court then set Oct. 14 as the new date for the final verdict and any appeal against it. Appearing before the court, the former mayoralty official categorically denied all charges leveled against him by the Control and Investigation Board (CIB). On the allegation that he covered up a project that was not carried out at its specified location, the accused maintained that the project was carried out before his appointment in the rain and flood administration and he had written a letter is this regard to the mayoralty. The accused also maintained that his telephone call to the engineer in the company that was carrying out the draining project was just to inquire the reason for shifting of the project's location. Among the charges against the former official was that he received a car from one of the companies carrying out a project for the mayoralty. The accused said he returned the car after using it for two years to the man who initially gave him the car. However, the company denied any knowledge about the car. The former official added that the contract that the second company was carrying out for flood drainage was worth SR70 million before it discovered the existence of an old flood drainage line. However, the representative of the Prosecution General insisted that the former mayoralty official had attested his confessions and that the letter he presented proves his connivance with the company. In another development, the court postponed the case against a former official in the Flood and Rainwater Drainage Administration in Jeddah Mayoralty and eight businessmen including one from a GCC country, as a defendant presented new documents to refute the charges leveled against them. The court responded to the request of the Prosecution General for a grace period to reply to the new documents in the defense memo.
