Page 705 - PERSIAN 5 1905_1911

103 ADMINISTRATION REPORT OF THE PER8IAN GULF
A table of the cases dealt with by the Agency during the year is appended
..... to this report. Mere numbers are, how.
ever, in themselves no certain criterion of
the amount of work entailed.
The heavy mortality due to plague placed a large number of estates m
the hands of the Agency. This type of case provides much work and is very
troublesome. The cases ore investigated by the Medjliss-ul-’Urf and that
body, which at best meets only once a week, is quite unequal to their rapid
despatch. None of the more important of these cases, which date from May
and onwards, have yet been concluded.
An attempt was made to increase temporarily the membership of the
Mcdjliss in order to enable it to supply two benches, but the gentlemen who
were invited to join it declined the honour. The circumstances of this
representative institution, which is in many ways deserving of respect, are
not altogether happy. The members are all busy merchants and it is often
difficult to get sufficient of them to attend. This leads to great delay of work,
and some waste of the time of the Agency staff.
The Agency is also much inconvenienced in its work by the inefficiency
of the local Administration. In particular the incompetence and slackness
of the Amir of Manama are distressing to a degree. This old dotard is
beyond all hope of, or capacity for, cure, but a substitute would not easily be
found. Defendants and witnesses are normally not presented, and the one
intelligent Fidawi which each Amir has, is frequently not in attendance owing
to illness or some such reason, xt is difficult even to get an answer to a letter
cut of the Amir of Manama. All this makes the court work very burden­
some. Systematic bullying and reporting might have some effect, but there
is no time for this. It is hoped sometime to take up the question seriously
and pursue it to some bitter end with Shaikh Isa.
The important case of the Katr debtor, Nasir-bin-Shahin-ul-Tuwar, was
eventually settled through a series of compromises by which the creditors
received in the end about 10 per cent, of their dues. He had been arrested in
February 1911 and was released in June 1911.
No Katr' debtor now ever offers to pay more than 25 per cent, of his debts,
following the example set by Shaikh ICasim-bin-Thani who, in 1809, got rid
of his debts by 16 per cent, payments.
The keen interest shown last year by Major Knox in enforcing the divers*
rights seems to have borne some fruit
Pearl Cases.
ITakhudas are said to have been more
careful in keeping their accounts and more just in settling with their
employes, and the number of suits filed since the close of the season is not as
yet very large. The prosperous nature of the season had no doubt some
effect in making the Nakhudas more generous.
The division of the pearling season into two sections, with a recess during
Ramzan, brought a large crop of suits into the Agency Court during that
month. It was assumed, however, that final accounts could only be legally
called for at the end of the season; so in the majority of cases efforts were
confined to obtaining payment of subsistence allowance to the divers, and
claims for final adjustment were dismissed.
In the cases now pending, the old difficulties are still encountered, viz.:—
(i) The unsatisfactory arrangement for supplying a Salifa Court,
(ti) The general unwillingness of the Nakhudas to produce their
accounts.
In March, Shaikh Isa personally promised the Political Resident to
reform the Salifa, and he lost no time in taking destructive measures, for
Bu-Kais, the unsatisfactory Judge, was very soon removed. Constructive
and reconstructive measures are, however, what the Shaikh fails in, and it
defied all his ingenuity and resources to elevate any one to Humpty Dumpt/s
vacated seat. In May, he appointed a temporary Board of which the com­
position was irreproachable, but which proved highly illusive, and eventually
vanished entirely out of existence. His promises were kept conscientiously
1
;