About 2,000 fake engineering certificates were discovered in 2014, according to local media quoting sources at the Saudi Council of Engineers (SCE) as saying.
The Philippines paced the countries where fake engineering certificates were detected with 460 certificates (23% of total). Other countries whose citizens were discovered with bogus documents include India, Egypt, Pakistan and Jordan.
According to Aleqtesadiya daily, the fake engineering papers came from over 200 universities. Sources said 10 fake certificates were already detected in January. The source warned if strict penalties are not enforced, the number of fake engineering certificates would climb further.
President of the SCE Hamad Al-Shaqawi said last November that a list of all engineers with forged trade certificates would be published soon. Al-Shaqawi added that these individuals will be banned totally from practicing their profession.
Despite the high number of fake certificates discovered, no one has so far been penalized yet.
Al-Shaqawi said that the council’s role is limited to uncovering forgeries, while prosecuting the people responsible for forgeries remains the responsibility of law-enforcement agencies. He said that implementing the punishment for forgery — which is a two-year prison sentence and defamation — should be applied without hesitation to those who have forged the certificates.
Bogus certificates were not limited to the engineering sector, but are present in the heath sector as well.