Ministry of Labour workers jailed for taking bribes totalling more than Dh4m

Duo took Dh200 for each of almost 21,000 illegal applications that they helped make happen.

DUBAI // Two Ministry of Labour employees have been found guilty of accepting bribes totalling more than Dh4 million in five years for illegal applications they helped process.

The pair were found guilty of taking a Dh200 bribe for each application from a total of 20,927 submissions they helped process in that time.

Dubai Criminal Court convicted a Jordanian, 38, and an Indian, 36, who both worked at the ministry’s IT department, but acquitted a 40-year-old Lebanese defendant from seeking and accepting bribes between January 2009 and June 2014.

The pair were found guilty of additional charges of forgery, use of forged electronic documents and fraudulently obtaining Dh650,225. Two other Indian defendants were also convicted of offering bribes and aiding and abetting.

All four of them were sentenced to three years in jail each and were jointly fined Dh4 million and ordered to pay a similar amount to the ministry.

The Indian pair were additionally fined Dh150,000.

The ministry IT workers were responsible for setting up usernames and passwords for employees and abused their positions by setting up login details for the two Indians who did not work for the ministry.

The Indian duo worked at typing centres and through having their own login details they were able to process applications illegally.

“We received several complaints from companies regarding certain applications in 2014 and, after double checking, the forgeries were discovered,” said the head of the control section at the ministry.

He said surveillance cameras showed the two IT workers doing their illegal business after working hours. He said that when the defendants were arrested, police found records of the unofficial usernames and passwords in their possession.

The court ordered that the ministry employees found guilty should be sacked.

All convicted defendants will be deported after serving their prison terms.