The UN’s Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has considered the case of Abdullah Ibhais and their conclusions are clear: There was never any wrongdoing on Ibhais’ part. The state of Qatar and the Supreme Committee, the World Cup organisers, are to blame for the trumped up charges and his imprisonment.
By Håvard Melnæs
In March, the UN’s Working Group had its 99th session and one of the cases they dug into was the trial of Abdullah Ibhais, the former media manager of the Supreme Committee who was sentenced first to five years in prison, which in a later court hearing was reduced to three years.
The Working Group found that the detention of Abdullah Ibhais falls under three categories of arbitrary detention; detention lacking any legal basis, detention resulting from the exercise of peaceful expression of opinion and non-observance of the international norms relating to the right to a fair trial.
Abdullah Ibhais was punished by his employer for standing up for thousands of starving and desperate migrant workers. The workers hadn’t received their salaries for up to six months, and hundreds of them were working on World Cup stadiums.
Abdullah Ibhais had denied to do what his boss, the secretary general of the Supreme Committee, Hassan Al Thawadi insisted he should do:
“We need to get our social media people to clarify that it’s not 2022 related.”
But Abdullah Ibhais, who had visited and talked to the striking migrant workers, interfered and told Al Thawadi that it was indeed very much related to the World Cup.
Hassan Al Thawadi then sent a voice message to a WhatsApp group called Crisis Comms and ordered his employees “to put a spin on it”. All senior members of the Supreme Committee were part of that group
This is the same man that during the World Cup in Qatar said in an interview with British tabloid reporter Piers Morgan that between 400 and 500 migrant workers had died working on World Cup projects.
Until then, Al Thawadi and the Supreme Committee had for years maintained that there had been three work-related deaths during the construction of World Cup stadiums and 37 non-work-related deaths.
The discussion in the Crisis Comms group back in August 2019, became heated and at one point the Supreme Committee’s director of digital media, Khalid Al Naama, shared his view:
“(…) Any spin we try to put on the delay will risk the State reputation because it would be an admission from us that there is indeed an issue with payments – in fact so bad that we have to pay the workers directly and in cash – because the wage protection system and electronic records failed them.”
“Nobody will know where you are”
Abdullah Ibhais was arrested the next month, when he arrived at the offices of the Supreme Committee in the Al Bidda Tower in West Bay in Doha. He was met by six police officers wearing Qatari thobes. Abdullah Ibhais asked the officers why he was arrested. A police officer from Qatar’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID), said “you will know in due time”.
As stated in the UN Working Group’s report: ”Ibhais did not gain access to a lawyer until nine days after his arrest”.
One CID officer told Abdullah Ibhais: “We will keep you here for six months and nobody will know where you are.”
Ibhais, a married man and father of two young sons, got frightened.
A few minutes later, one of the CID officers returned with three or four pages of a printed confession in Arabic. The confession stated that Abdullah Ibhais had awarded a social media tender to a Turkish bidder in return for Turkish citizenship. Ibhais tried to tell the officer that the confession made no sense because the Supreme Committee hadn’t accepted any bids and he had been a part of the team that had made this decision.
The court case started 19 January in 2021. Khalid Al-Kubaisi, the SC’s Chief of Advisory Unit & Special Projects, who was heading the so-called internal investigation into the tender, was asked by the judge if he had found any wrongdoing on Ibhais’ part. His short answer was “no”.
Nevertheless, Abdullah received a five-year prison sentence and a fine of 150,000 Qatari riyals (41,197 dollars) on 29 April.
On 6 October 2021 Human Rights Watch and FairSquare released a joint statement about the case of Abdullah Ibhais. “Qatari authorities appear to have robbed Abdullah Ibhais of his right to a fair trial in proceedings that raise serious concerns about Qatar’s justice system.”
The deleted interview
Abdullah Ibhais was still a free man pending his appeal. That soon changed. Early morning on Monday 15 November 2021, police officers arrived at Abdullah Ibhais’ home. He was arrested and imprisoned in Doha. The Qatari authorities offered no reason for the arrest. Ibhais told Josimar he believed he was arrested because he had an interview appointment with Norwegian state broadcaster NRK later that same day.
Ibhais immediately started a hunger strike, telling family and friends that he would continue the hunger strike “until I am proven innocent or I’d rather die”. Ten days into the hunger strike, the prison guards denied him salt, which medical experts said would make him develop serious health issues soon. After 30 days on hunger strike, Abdullah Ibahis’ family finally convinced him to stop and start eating again.
The two reporters from NRK, who had the interview appointment with Ibhais later that day he was arrested, were arrested later that week, allegedly for trespassing.
But was that a diversion to hide the real reason: to prevent the publication of an interview NRK did with Hassan Al-Thawadi where NRK had asked the head of the Supreme Committee several questions about Abdullah Ibhais?
The NRK team was arrested just after they had finished their interview with Hassan Al Thawadi. Their equipment was confiscated and the interview was deleted. The alleged trespassing had occurred four days earlier. So why would the Qatari police wait four days and then arrest them immediately after the interview with the secretary general of the Supreme Committee?
“A victory for Abdullah”
The UN Working Group has requested to the government of Qatar to take the following four steps:
To take the steps necessary to remedy the situation of Mr Ibhais without delay and bring it into conformity with the relevant international norms.
Taking into account all the circumstances of the case, the appropriate remedy would be to release Mr Ibhais and accord him an enforceable right to compensation and other reparations, in accordance with international law.
Urges the Government to ensure a full and independent investigation of the circumstances surrounding the arbitrary deprivation of liberty of Mr Ibhais and to take appropriate measures against those responsible for the violation of his rights.
Requests the Government to disseminate the present opinion through all available means and as widely as possible.
In a statement from Abdullah Ibhais’ family they say that the opinion from the UN Working Group “forms a victory for Abdullah, as it is his first time to be given a chance to justice by any legal body since he was arrested and tried in Qatar, in retaliation to his refusal to issue a statement to cover up the plight of striking migrant workers who were participating in building Al Bayt and Education City stadiums in August 2019”.
Fifa president Gianni Infantino praised the 2022 World Cup as “unique”, “perfect” and a “great success”. Hassan Al Thawadi to the right.
Calling out Fifa and sponsors
Now that Abdullah Ibhais’ name has been cleared, “there is no legal basis for keeping him in Qatari prison”, says his family. In their statement they call for “the Qatari Authorities to adhere to the four requests made by the UNWGAD. We further hold the Qatari Authorities responsible for his life and health especially that no check-up or test results about his health were given to us since his arrest, although he underwent a 30-days hunger strike in 2021.”
The family also says that “this opinion proves without hesitation how far FIFA is from its promises to protect whistleblowers and maintain human rights in the World Cup. We hold FIFA and its executive persons responsible for the arbitrary detention of Abdullah in Qatar in which they were complicit, and decided not to intervene although the case was brought to their direct personal attention before Abdullah’s detention.”
“We call upon the FIFA sponsors, especially Adidas to intervene in this case and put real pressure on FIFA to achieve justice for Abdullah and his wife and two young kids; especially that this case was brought to their attention as well since its early stages.”