Islamic centre trustee is criminal who sold stolen mobile phones
A NEW Islamic centre responsible for the care and education of children as young as five has appointed to a key position a convicted criminal who sold mobile phones stolen from teenagers.
Sheffield’s Emaan Islamic Centre includes among its trustees a shopkeeper who received an 18-month suspended sentence in 2016 after admitting five counts of handling stolen goods.
Aiman Mohammed Saeed, 51, sold phones stolen in street robberies and from nightclubs. A court heard Saeed, who runs a shop, was caught on camera selling stolen iPhones to undercover officers and asking them to steal Xboxes and PS4 games for his business.
At the time, Saeed was a trustee of the Emaan mosque and Islamic centre project. The centre boasts that it will “promote and teach Islamic morals and values to new Muslim generations”.
In court, he was dubbed as a Faginlike figure who encouraged “people to steal things so he could sell them”. He has been a trust officer since 2009.
The Emaan Islamic Centre – funded by Kuwaiti and Qatari sponsors – faced criticism last year after The Daily Telegraph revealed that a cleric reported to be a supporter of the Muslim Brother- hood (MB) was overseeing its construction plans. The former British ambassador to Saudi Arabia in 2014 said the MB “promotes values that appear intolerant of equality and freedom of faith and belief ”. However, it is not a designated terrorist organisation.
Khalid Al-Mathkour, who has been a trustee since April 2016, is also chairman of Kuwait’s sharia council and has previously called for Barbie dolls to be banned for wearing “revealing clothes”.
The mosque also included as a trustee until last year, Essam Al-Fulaji, who issued anti-Semitic statements, including that Jews “are the ones controlling the world”, that “Zionists and Mossad were behind the September 11 attacks”. The trust last year said Dr Al-Fulaji had ceased to be a trustee by mutual agreement because “some of [his] views are incompatible with the workings and objectives of the Emaan Trust, and in particular in serving the wider community in Sheffield”.
The Henry Jackson Society thinktank said Saeed’s inclusion as a trustee showed the Emaan trust was “unsuitable to run a mosque or... educate and raise the young”.
Saeed, from his shop, said: “I’m not involved in any aspect of education or young people at the centre. Everybody knows about my conviction...”
Hameed Asaly, the trust chairman, said the board would review his appointment. “This is the first time we have heard about Mr Saeed’s criminal record,” he said. “We will look into it and take appropriate action, which may involve asking him to resign.”
The Emaan Trust last night said that Aiman Mohammed Saeed had indeed resigned after The Sunday Telegraph informed the charity’s board of trustees of his criminal conviction.
The Trust said last year it was “urgently investigating” the revelations about Mr Al-Mathkour.
He declined to comment at the time and remains in his role as trustee.