Derek Achong

For­mer In­ter-Re­li­gious Or­gan­i­sa­tion pres­i­dent, Bro No­ble Khan, is ex­pect­ed to take the wit­ness stand to­day, for a sixth time. In the on­go­ing sedi­tion tri­al of Ja­maat-al-Mus­limeen leader Yasin Abu Bakr. Khan, the last State wit­ness in the tri­al, is ex­pect­ed to be cross-ex­am­ined by Bakr's de­fence at­tor­ney Wayne Sturge.

Dur­ing pre­vi­ous days of cross-ex­am­i­na­tion Khan was asked about his knowl­edge of the Qur'an and the prin­ci­ple of za­kaat. Za­kaat, which was the main theme of Bakr's speech, re­quires that Mus­lims give two-and-a-half per cent of their wealth to char­i­ty. Khan's cross-ex­am­i­na­tion was put on pause two weeks ago be­cause of le­gal ar­gu­ments be­tween Sturge and spe­cial pros­e­cu­tor Dana See­ta­hal, SC, which con­clud­ed yes­ter­day.

While ad­dress­ing the nine-mem­ber ju­ry hear­ing the tri­al in the Port-of-Spain Third Crim­i­nal Court, Jus­tice Mark Mo­hammed as­sured them it would fin­ish by mid-Au­gust. The tri­al, which was sched­uled to be­gin ear­li­er this year, start­ed last month be­cause of an in­jury to Bakr's an­kle. On his doc­tor's rec­om­men­da­tion, Bakr, a di­a­bet­ic, has been al­lowed to rest his in­jured leg on a cush­ion dur­ing hear­ings.

He is fac­ing four crim­i­nal charges in re­la­tion to his 2005 Eid-ul-Fitr ser­mon to about 200 sup­port­ers at the Ja­maat's head­quar­ters, Mu­cu­rapo Road, St James. The charges are com­mu­ni­cat­ing a state­ment with a sedi­tious in­tent, en­deav­our­ing to pro­voke a breach of the peace and two charges of in­cit­ing oth­ers to de­mand mon­ey by men­ace. Khan was brought as a State wit­ness in the mat­ter be­cause Bakr al­leged­ly re­ferred di­rect­ly to him dur­ing the speech.