ABU DHABI // A man who is accused of forging 17 Haj permits denied he acted illegally at the Criminal Court on Wednesday.
The Emirati accused, M, showed pilgrims a TV interview of himself to convince them he was an authorised Haj agent, said a witness testifying in court.
“Once we arrived in Jeddah airport we found him waiting for us there and he gave us Haj permits with the stamp of the Awqaf (Authority of Islamic Affairs & Endowments),” the witness said.
“We had paid him a deposit and agreed to pay the full amount after he hands us the permits, so I paid him the remaining Dh90,000 from myself and those accompanying me.”
Once the 100 pilgrims who had signed up reached Mecca, he did not commit to the terms and conditions of their contract.
The witness said they agreed they would be staying four to a room, but when they reached the hotel, which was far from the holy mosque in Mecca, they were told each room would house 10 pilgrims.
“When we went to Mina, there were no tents for us so he took us to the Iranian missionary to stay in their tent,” the witness said.
“So we headed to the official UAE Haj missionary office and it turned out the permits we had were forged.”
The second witness, a head of legal affairs at the authority, said they had received many complaints from pilgrims against the defendant; “and we discovered there was a forged missionary, and we took the proper procedures and confiscated the forged permits.”
He added that there was a general notice against the defendant issued by the authority after they discovered his forging practices. Moreover, all UAE Haj agencies are licensed by the authority, and any person can confirm if they have a license.
M said he took money from the pilgrims and witnessed the signing of the contracts, and the agency was legal and licensed from another Gulf country which issued the Haj permits.
He said there was a deadline to apply for UAE based agencies which is the beginning of Ramadan, so some applicants who miss the deadline sign up with regional agencies instead. He said he only works as a volunteer with these agencies and was a pilgrim himself and coordinator between the agency and the pilgrims and a promoter.
The first witness asked why the permits would have the UAE missionary’s stamp on them if he was working for another GCC country.
The second witness said there was no such thing as a volunteer or coordinator, because all Haj agency staff are registered with the authority.
A verdict will be announced on June 17.
hdajani@thenational.ae
