Govt’s building rent contract signed with deceased person

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Ministry of Finance has extended the rent contract of a government’s building with a person who has died years ago.

The Government Real Estate Department was shifted from the Ministry of Finance to the Ministry of Urban Development and Land in July 2019 following a presidential decree.

On December 15, 2019, the Presidential Palace in a letter asked the Ministry of Urban Development and Land (MUDL) to evaluate all contracts made by the Ministry of Finance.

MUDL on January 7, 2020 had shared a report with the Presidential Palace in response to the letter of the Presidential Palace.

The report said that the contract of the government’s apartment in Jada-i-Maiwand area in the first police district of Kabul had been given a person who had died years ago.

The report said they had identified a contract of a building which involved forgery and it was still in effect.

The building was given for 32,760 afghanis rent for a period of three years during an open competition in 2011, the source said.

The same building was given on a rent of 36,036 afghanis for a second time three years later in 2014, to a person named Musafar Khan and the third time it was given on a rent of 39,640 afghanis to the same person in 2019. However, Musfar Khan died late in 2014.

MUDL also shared copies of some documents about the contracts and said that the fingerprints used in contract papers of 2019 varied from the ones signed in the past.

The ministry said a number of workers of the Government Real Estate Department and an official of the municipality had misused the new contract.

The MUDL report had demanded barring the mentioned figures from traveling abroad, suspension of their jobs and referring them to judicial organs for investigations.

The real estate department workers say that family members of Musafar Khan had forged the contract in order not to lose it.

They say the government did not suffer any losses and the contract was extended on a higher rent compared to the past, but the problem was only forgery by the relatives of Musafar Khan, who died years ago.

Based on Article 1387 of the civil law, the heirs can continue a lease contract signed by a person who has died, they said.

Mds/ma