Two separate incidents in recent weeks have given me cause for alarm. Both were reported in the Arabic Al-Watan newspaper, and both concerned the same organ, the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.

In the first incident, Al-Watan reported that a Saudi woman in her 40s was manhandled and beaten up by three officials of this body in Khamis Mushayt. According to the story, the woman charged that these officials pounced upon her as she was on her way back to her farm in a taxi. The commission vehicle forced the taxi to stop, and the commission’s officer was involved in a physical altercation with her, before she was led to their vehicle and dealt more of the same by two other officials.

She was then locked up, her mobile phone confiscated, and only released when her son was brought in and made to sign a paper that she had not been mistreated. Later, she was checked at the local military hospital, where it was confirmed that she had sustained some physical abuse as a “result of the alleged beatings.” However, Hasan Hatshan Al-Qarni, director of the commission’s office in Khamis Mushayt’s Aziziya district, flatly denied the allegation that his officials “beat her.” “If the woman insists that she was attacked, then we have to check the medical report to prove it,” Al-Qarni added.

In the other incident and with a more bizarre twist, a Saudi father in Riyadh placed several gas cylinders under his car while his three daughters were sitting on the trunk. He threatened to light the gas cylinders and blow up the car and his whole family.

His reason, Al-Watan reported, was that some time back he had suffered humiliation at the hands of the branch of this commission in Riyadh.

“The man alleged that three years ago he had been insulted and unfairly arrested in a mall, imprisoned with his small daughters for several hours without basic facilities and drinking water and on release made to sign a document relinquishing his complaint against the committee. Subsequent attempts to get justice had come to nothing, the man said.”

His apparent frustrations with the organs of justice and their reluctance to investigate his complaints and mete out punishment to those twisted minds involved had apparently blown a fuse in this poor man’s psyche and led him to such a drastic measure.

This time, Al-Watan contacted Sheikh Tariq Al-Bahlan, the head of the Committee for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice’s headquarters in King Fahd District, who in so many words replied that Al-Watan newspaper had “no standing to intervene in such matters,” and that it was none of their business. Al-Watan then submitted the case to the Governorate of Riyadh for further investigations.

Here is the good part. It is energizing to see a local newspaper pursue an issue in the interest of truth and justice. For too long, the standard fare in our daily tabloids has not touched upon the hard reality or issues of social concern. The public deserves better. And I praise those at Al-Watan who have risen to the challenge.

The bad part in all of this is the immediate and automatic denials that were tossed out by the heads of the commission in both cities. Rather than note the allegations and make a serious and truthful effort to investigate such alleged aberrant behavior by some of their own officers, the blame for these bizarre incidents seems to have shifted to the victims.

And the ugly part is, if indeed these allegations are true, that such people are allowed to operate under official banners, and are licensed to do it in any manner they choose. I call on the governing body of the commission to take a closer look at the activities of such individuals, bar them from future service, introduce a battery of psychological tests to weed out possible troublemakers, and re-define the charter of the commission, which is supposed to promote virtue rather than create stress.

Notwithstanding the undertakings given under duress by the parties involved, absolving the commission of any wrongdoings as reported, fanatics and extremists of any kind must be stamped out before they succeed in walking all over the society we care about.

Arab News Features 24 May 2003