Burglarized Pinoy pilgrims agree to cash settlement

COTABATO CITY – Philippine embassy and Saudi government officials have agreed to indemnify Filipino pilgrims who lost more than P500,000 when their hotel rooms were burglarized while they were performing hajj last month.

This was disclosed by National Commission on Muslim Filipinos (NCMF) External Affairs Bureau Director Jun Alonto Datu Ramos who said that Filipino pilgrims, under sheikhs Abdulcarim Imam and Said Asgar, discovered that their four rooms at Hotel Manarat were ransacked by still unknown culprits.

The pilgrim-victims complained to the hotel management that cash, laptops and other valuable belongings were lost in the robbery, prompting an investigation that estimated the total loss at R574,000, Datu Ramos said.

Philippine embassy officials Moamar Ayo, Abdulhalim Langco and Faisal Tamano responded to the scene as Saudi police probers and hotel management got into a heated argument with the victims because of the incident.

The intercession of the embassy officials came just at the right time as all parties eventually agreed that the victims will just be indemnified for the possessions they lost in the burglary.

The settlement cut short a supposed long and punitive Islamic judicial process, which usually would prescribe the amputation of hands for persons found guilty of theft, it was learned.

Meanwhile, Datu Ramos confirmed that an undetermined number of Saudibased workers joined the Philippine hajj delegation by faking NCMF-issued identification cards.

The anomaly was earlier exposed in the social media by Zahir Mamalinta, representative of Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Vice Chairman Ghazali Jaafar whom President Duterte had designated as Amerul Hajj or Philippine delegation chief for this year.