In July, the SSC sentenced Qudah
in his capacity as former Board Chairman of the Jordan Petroleum Refining Co.
(JPRC), the firm’s CEO Ahmad Rifai, economic
adviser to the prime minister Mohammad Rawashdeh and business tycoon Khalid
Shaheen for three years, but left them free until the
verdict is examined by the appellate jurisdiction.
The four men were condemned in connection with a 1.2
billion dollar contract which was won by Shaheen for
the fourth expansion of Jordan ’s
sole refinery.
Other bidders withdrew from the competition in
ambiguous circumstances during the global downturn at the end of 2008.
The four men were detained early in March and
referred to the SSC in a case that dominated the attention of the public
opinion in a country that rarely witnessed the trial of people of such high calibre.
