CAIRO: Egypt’s Grand Mufti said Saturday that he has filed a complaint to the Prosecutor General and the Journalists’ Syndicate against Al-Wafd for alleging that he was engaged in money laundering activities through a private computer company called Tridigital, which the newspaper claimed belongs to Gomaa.
The opposition paper published a front page story in its weekly edition on July 9 by staff writer Adel Sabry, titled “The Republic’s Grand Mufti runs an Organization that receives Millions of Dollars in Donations from Foreign Entities. The subtitle said, “A Money Laundering Unit Detected the Donations Process in Banks in Switzerland and England.
The initial story was followed by two others in the consecutive daily issues in Al-Wafd on Friday and Saturday, without mentioning the name of the authority that detected the money laundering operations. It also failed to mention why there was no action taken against the Mufti if those operations were monitored by authorities.
In a press conference, Gomaa denied the entire story, adding that he sent the newspaper an official response where he refuted all the accusations, but that the newspaper did not publish it.
In its Saturday issue, Al-Wafd denied receiving any reply from Gomaa. No one from the news desk at Al-Wafd was unavailable for comment at time press.
Gomaa, who emphasized that he is against taking journalists to court, said that reporter who wrote the story has “damaged [his] honor and should be held responsible for his actions. however, if the newspaper is willing to publish a retraction and an apology, he will forgive him.
Gomaa also sent an official complaint to the chairman of the Journalists’ Syndicate, Makram Mohamed Ahmed, regarding the newspaper’s defamatory accusation while attaching documents proving that the allegations are false.
“I have sent this official memo to the syndicate because they usually complain that we [officials who are falsely attacked by the press] do not complain to the syndicate, Gomaa said.
Ahmed confirmed to Daily News Egypt that he has received Gomaa’s complaint and has personally spoken to him and agrees that Al-Wafd should retract its “false accusations according to the official documents that the Mufti attached with his complaint.
“I will pass on my decision to the syndicate’s board members for approval, then we will send a memo to Al-Wafd newspaper to correct the news. If it does not respond, I will unfortunately be obliged to refer the journalist who wrote the story to the syndicate’s disciplinary committee.
Ahmed also said that he spoke to the Prosecutor General asking him to allow the Syndicate to solve the problem internally instead of sending the case to court.
“The syndicate will take action in this case in the coming 48 hours, Ahmed said.
On the other hand, Hana Al-Baydany, general manger of Tridigital, who was also present at the press conference, clearly indicated that Gomaa is neither the company’s owner nor a high board member.
Al-Baydany said that Tridigital is a legal company established in 2000, listing the names of the company’s ex-chairmen since the company’s establishment.
She hinted that the false news may have been disseminated by Mustafa Galal Abdel Rahman, the company’s ex-finance manager who was fired last year after it was discovered that he was working with a competing company.
Abdel Rahman had filed a lawsuit against the company demanding LE 10 million in compensation and threatened to cause a scandal if the company didn’t pay him, Al-Baydany said.
