DOHA: A lower Qatari court has ordered two state employees — both nationals — to do community service for 10 days each after it convicted them of a minor offence.
The court verdict is path-breaking and comes barely four days after Qatar’s Attorney General issued a decision based on amendments to a 2009 penal code suggesting community service for the employees of some ministries and state agencies who are accused of committing minor offence while on duty.
Vide the decision a preliminary court could, instead of sentencing a state employee charged with a minor offence to prison, ask him to do community service for a maximum 12 days.
In case a convict refuses to abide by a court’s community service order, he is liable to be sentenced to 12 weeks in jail.
One of the above convicts has been asked to memorise verses of the Holy Quran for 10 days, while the other will supervise cleaning in a mosque for a similar period.
While a minor offence committed by an employee of a designated state departments or ministries is to be reported to a lower court by the Prosecution, the court order is to be executed by the ministry or the department that employs the convict.
The Attorney General’s decision, for instance, specifies that an employee of the Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs found guilty of committing a minor offence could be asked by a preliminary court to either memorise verses of the Holy Quran or help others do that, or do cleaning work in a mosque as punishment — both for a short period of time as a community service.
Local Arabic daily Al Watan hinted that the two erring employees might have been found guilty of assaulting someone.
The Peninsula
