JEDDAH – An engineer working for a well-known company in Jeddah and a suspended senior official from the Jeddah Municipality will appear end of January before the Jeddah Administrative Court on bribery charges. The engineer is accused of giving the suspended official a bribe and land worth SR1.3 million in exchange for expediting the processing of eight transactions for the company the engineer worked for. In a previous hearing at the same court, the engineer denied all charges against him, claiming that he was forced to confess that he gave a bribe to the second defendant by investigators. He told the court that he did not give the suspended official any kickbacks. When he knew that the official wanted to buy the land but did not have money, he offered to buy the land and then sell the land onto him for SR1.4 million, repayable in installments. He said he paid the full amount for the land and signed an agreement in the presence of two witnesses that the official would repay the money in installments. The engineer agreed with the official that if the latter failed to repay the money, he would have the right to own half of the land and become a partner. “How is this bribery?” he told the judge. The official denied that he took bribes from the engineer, saying that his initial confessions were made under duress. He also told the court that he signed an official property purchase land agreement with the engineer and paid him SR400,000 for the first installment. He also said that he since paid several installments that amounted to around SR700,000.
