- A former Saudi minister granted exceedingly large salaries to department heads amounting to $34,000
- A contract was signed with an employee as adviser and director of the transfer office in the ministry with a monthly salary of more than $13,300
- The ex-minister also hired relatives as consultants for monthly salaries ranging between $13,300 and $24,000
He had been questioned in the case of the rain floods in Jeddah but was never charged
Cases of corruption and administrative and financial irregularities are slowly emerging in the investigations conducted against around 50 high-profile people detained in Saudi Arabia on suspicion of graft.
Saudi authorities on Saturday arrested princes, former ministers, and businessmen in a massive anti-graft drive.
In one case, a former minister granted astronomical salaries to some of the department heads that amounted to SR150,000 ($34,000) in addition to allowances.
Some of the secretarial staff received salaries of up to SR30,000 ($8,000) paid through companies under contracts worth millions, Saudi daily Okaz reported on Wednesday.
A contract was signed with an employee as adviser and director of the transfer office in the ministry with a monthly salary of more than SR50,000 ($13,300).
The ex-minister also hired relatives as consultants for monthly salaries ranging between SR50,000 ($13,300) and SR90,000 ($24,000).
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Excesses were also discovered in contracts with companies, the daily said.
The former minister signed a contract with a private media company to run the ministry's social media account, post awareness content and interact online with users.
The former minister also faces suspicions he had squandered SR10.3 million ($2.75 million) on contracts with a private company to run an advertising campaign for seven weeks and SR8.9 million ($2.37 million) on training staff. The programmes were canceled for their poor quality and modest output.
The minister who replaced him canceled and suspended 38 of the 148 contracts by the ministry amid suspicions of financial irregularities.
The daily said that the former minister had been questioned in the case of the rain floods in Jeddah, but was never charged.
This article has been adapted from its original source.
