Saudi Arabia: Arrests of officials and businessmen for allegedly fighting corruption

Saudi Arabia’s Supervision and Anti-Corruption Authority (Nazaha) said that it had filed some criminal cases and legal procedures after the arrests of officials and businessmen on Sunday.

Among the most prominent cases is the arrest of a retired major general and retired employees of the Ministry of National Guard for obtaining 198 million riyals ($52.8 million) from local companies and one foreign company in exchange for their help in winning contracts.

In the second case, the former director-general of projects at the Ministry of Higher Education and five businessmen were accused of establishing companies and obtaining projects for the ministry through them, exaggerating prices and obliging other companies to contract with the ministry deal with them and obtain funds.

It was indicated that work is underway to calculate the amount that was embezzled.

In the third case, an employee working for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was arrested for illegally spending approximately 733,000 riyals from the account of one of the Kingdom’s embassies.

In the fourth case, an employee of the Ministry of Information was arrested to issue 328 media licenses and obtain about 700,000 riyals.

Employees of a regional branch of the Ministry of Finance were suspended from work after two citizens bribed them with an amount of 126 thousand riyals out of a total of 8 million riyals agreed upon, in exchange for facilitating the payment of financial compensation.

In the sixth case, three employees of the Education Department in one of the governorates were suspended for obtaining cash instalments of 624 thousand riyals from a businessman in exchange for facilitating access to seven projects worth 3.2 million riyals.

As for the seventh case, in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice, a notary was arrested in one of the regions for issuing an irregularly lost deed to one of his relatives.

In cooperation with the Ministry of Interior, an officer with the rank of captain working in a regional branch of the General Administration for Drug Control was arrested for obtaining 35,000 riyals from an expatriate to hold a case related to his brother.

There is another case related to a bank employee in one of the Kingdom’s governorates, who was suspended from work because he obtained 21,000 Saudi riyals from some of the bank’s clients in exchange for completing their financing procedures.

The last case concerns two employees working in a municipality who were arrested for receiving 25,000 riyals.