People living in the Al-Matar neighborhood complained to the municipality and filed an official complaint with the local branch of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice. The contractor insisted on finishing the job on time and his heavy equipment destroyed half of the graveyard.

The commission’s Al-Oyoon branch had called for a review of the job months ago and had told the municipality to stop construction until the graveyard was protected with a fence or bodies affected by the work had at least been transferred to another cemetery.

According to people in the neighborhood, the cemetery is old and up to ten people are buried there. They said that more than 30 years ago a local resident offered to fence the cemetery and demanded a permit to carry out the work from the municipality, which never responded.

The official spokesman for the Madinah municipality, Bandar Al-Rubaish, said that the commission is keen to protect cemeteries and the dignity of the dead. He said that the commission would contact the Madinah governorate office to discuss further steps.