RIYADH: The Ministry of Social Affairs has handled carefully the case of an elderly man, who complained about minister’s delay in dealing with his issue.

A video clip showing him standing in front of the administration building at Taif University, where the minister was attending a meeting with the education minister and other high officials, had gone viral.

Later, Minister Majed Al-Qasabi spoke to the elderly man in person and assured him that all of his demands would be met in due time, according to sources. He rather assigned some concerned officials to resolve his problems pertaining to social insurance.

The old man earlier complained that the minister was purportedly avoiding meeting him, as he waited outside to meet him.

“I have been waiting for the last seven hours to see Minister Majed Al-Qasabi, but in the end I still have not been able to see him,” he said.

Taif University’s Public Relations Director Dr. Abdulrahman Al-Talahi, however, rubbished the reports published on social media websites about the two ministers having supposedly left through back doors to avoid the crowds.

Al-Talahi said many of the recent conferences and meetings held at Taif University involved relatively long days, beginning at eight in the morning and ending at six in the evening, thus making the appearances of these ministers before and after events difficult to track.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education, in a public statement, said the minister of social affairs went straight to other locations inside the university immediately and was unaware of a person awaiting him.

When the minister came to know about it, he met and listened to the elderly man and others, and issued directives to solve their problems, he said.