Of mercy and pardon

Khor Fakkan: A father who pardoned two men who raped his seven-year-old daughter said that he does not regret his decision that was made by him minutes before the men were to face the firing squad.

Gulam Hafiz Qader, a Pakistani imam who is in his early 50s, told Gulf News that he pardoned the two rapists for the love of Allah.

Gulf News revisited the imam to find out how he is coping with the tragic loss of his daughter.

"I have not forgotten what they did to my daughter and I never will," he said.

His daughter Khadija was raped by two UAE nationals and then left to die near a wadi in Masafi in 1997.

Khadija was abducted by the two men while she was playing with her friends under a berry tree near their house. Not a day passes without them remembering her infectious laughter, her parents say.

Body found

Her body was found nine days later near a flooded wadi (dry riverbed) by a group of young shepherds herding goats when they smelt rotting flesh. At first they thought one goat, which was missing, had died. They instead found Khadija's body. In 2004, the Federal Supreme Court in Abu Dhabi had handed down capital punishments to the two men after a trial that lasted seven years.

He said the memory of the day when he went to witness the two rapists face the firing squad is still fresh in his mind.

"I do not recollect the exact date. I was unable to sleep the night before I was to go to watch them face the firing squad. As a father I was carrying this enormous pain in my heart. I was keen to see the two men die for the heinous crime they committed. But God willed otherwise," said Qader.

He said that he remembered waking up early on the execution day just to make sure he would not be late to see the men die.

"I offered my Fajr prayers at a petrol station. All my way to Sharjah jail I was thinking of my daughter and the pain that she was made to go through by the two men," he said.

Qader said that when he reached the jail premises he was led to an open area where the men were to face a firing squad.

"There were about four men who were to face bullets on that particular day. It was dawn. The men wore red uniforms with their hands tied behind their back. The uniform had a white spot marked near the pocket. A couple of minutes later after I reached the place nine men with guns got down from a vehicle. They lined up aiming their guns. The men were being brought one by one to face the firing squad.

Marked to die

"The first to face the squad was an Asian. A shot was fired at the white spot on the uniform. I stood there along with other officials watching the entire thing.

"It was now time for one of the two men convicted of raping my daughter to face the bullet. He was made to stand about 20 feet from the firing squad. At that particular moment, I did not know why exactly I did what I did. I just turned and said, 'Please, I pardon the two men,'" he said.

Qader said the two men looked so relieved and they could not stop thanking him. "I just told them it is God that they should be thankful to. They promised me that they would spend the rest of their lives in the service of Allah. Their parents wanted to get in touch with me, but I refused to see them. The two men are now back in jail," he said.

Qader's three children are married except the youngest daughter who was just five when Khadija died. "The family is still scarred. We still carry the pain of losing one of our daughters," said Qader.