# Reality Check



## Tropicana (Apr 29, 2010)

Just a reality check (no pun intended) to counter the rosy image many people paint of Dubai. 

Here is the story of a person jailed for bounced cheques, what is surprising is the woman has to pay a years extra rent even though the landlord renewed the contract without her signature.....

It also shows how people can land in jail even if cheques werent issued with any bad intent 

gulfnews : Dud cheque destroys German mother's life

Manja Kathrin Konig shows a picture of her daughters Katarina, Kimberly and Tiffany, which was taken two years ago. Image Credit: Virendra Saklani/Xpress Dubai: A German businesswoman is running from pillar to post to get her life back on track after serving 18 months in jail for a bounced cheque.

Manja Kathrin Konig, 47, who was released in October last year, said she became a "victim of unfortunate circumstances" when her business partner deposited her "unnamed" Dh480,000 "security cheque" into his bank account.

The cheque, which bounced, was issued as a guarantee by Konig to her Austrian partner, who also happened to be a family friend, as he had invested in her business in the UAE.

Sequence of events

Konig's Austrian husband Peter, whom she married in 1991, died in February 2005 following a heart attack. She herself underwent surgery in early 2006 to remove a brain tumour. At that time, her oncologist gave her six months to live. It was then that she decided to sell her family chemicals business in Austria. On August 22, 2006, Konig launched a beverage trading company in Dubai, a city which she had often visited before her husband's death.

In June 2009, following the bounced-cheque complaint from her business partner, Konig was sentenced to nine months in prison after spending a month in detention.

_As a result of her imprisonment, her rent cheque bounced too and four months were added to her jail term. She was further made to serve another four months for an "absconding" report lodged by the Free Zone authority._
"My children have gone through severe trauma. I just want to stand on my own feet again.

"I've been told that the Austrian government had arranged for their deportation. I want to tell my daughters that I am not a criminal and I love them. There's nothing else in life I want but to be with them, to see them grow up," she said. The last photograph that Konig has of her three daughters — who all hold Austrian passports — is two years old.

Caught in what she said was a "vicious cycle", Konig is appealing to "people of goodwill" and her compatriots to help her out of her legal limbo in Dubai. "Someone from the German consulate in Dubai visited me in jail with a list of lawyers, but I don't have the money to pay an acceptance fee," she said.

She currently lives off the goodwill of a female friend in Ajman while her financial obligations have been piling up for each day. Konig's residence visa also expired on August 14, 2010.

In their happier days, Konig ran a company that employed nearly 30 people in Dubai and Saudi Arabia. They lived in a posh four-bedroom villa in Jumeirah Islands paid for by her company, had two nannies and her children went to elite Dubai schools.

All of that started to vanish since the dud cheque case was lodged. Without a lawyer to face her landlord, who renewed her tenancy contract without her signature, all her belongings inside the villa vanished without trace.

Her two under-age daughters, Katarina, 10, and Kimberly, 12, are now under the care of the government-run Oberwart orphanage in Austria, while her eldest daughter Tiffany, 18, is living with her paternal grandparents in Burgenland, 70 km south of Vienna.

Her status is still that of an absconder as she has to pay Dh39,000 in fees for her company in the Free Zone, even though the company had stopped operating by the time she landed in jail.

*The Dubai rent court has now ruled that Konig must pay her former landlord Dh401,985 for the remaining period of the tenancy contract after her landlord renewed it without her signature when she was in jail.*
She fears she will not see her children again if she returns to prison. "I would like to have our lives back. I'm just thankful when I wake up everyday that I'm still alive," Konig said.


----------



## Jynxgirl (Nov 27, 2009)

There are ways to get out... if she is free, why doesnt she??? I hate to say run but in some instances, when you have no other options as you can not get a work visa to work, little left to do. What does the government expect to win in this situation????


----------



## Andy Capp (Oct 5, 2008)

The crazy thing is she's in catch 22, she can't work without a visa (legally) and until she pays the cash back she "owes" she can't leave the country - legally at least. If she hasn't got a passport she needs to get one from Germany and look at other options.

Not easy, but do-able.


----------



## Mr Rossi (May 16, 2009)

I don't think many people see a rosy picture of Dubai these days and see it for the archaic, illogical mess that it is, however....

1) Why, when previously only six months to live, was she setting up a business in Dubai and not going to Disneyland, swimming with Dolphins, on safari, riding Elephants, seeing the Nothern Lights etc?

2) And this is harsh but - it's her own fault for signing the original blank cheque.


----------



## Gavtek (Aug 23, 2009)

Why doesn't she just re-schedule her debt repayments for about 20 years in the future like Nakheel or Dubai World did?


----------



## MaidenScotland (Jun 6, 2009)

Mr Rossi said:


> I don't think many people see a rosy picture of Dubai these days and see it for the archaic, illogical mess that it is, however....
> 
> 1) Why, when previously only six months to live, was she setting up a business in Dubai and not going to Disneyland, swimming with Dolphins, on safari, riding Elephants, seeing the Nothern Lights etc?
> 
> 2) And this is harsh but - it's her own fault for signing the original blank cheque.




Yes 6 months to live and she goes off to a foreign country with her children to set up a business... sorry but that sound a ludicrous tale to me,


----------



## Moe78 (Oct 29, 2010)

I'm still wondering how the landlord renewed the contract without her signature/consent?

And yes, with 6 months to live, why are you trying to establish a business in Dubai of all places! She must know this place was a mess before the crisis and just got worse after.

As for the blank cheque, sometimes you do crazy things for people you believe are your friends


----------



## Jynxgirl (Nov 27, 2009)

She did this in 2006, when Dubai was booming and promising. 

I dont understand why she doesnt do something now... can not change the past. Why sit and wait for the worst??


----------



## Moe78 (Oct 29, 2010)

I still don't get how the landlord got the contract renewed.


----------



## Tropicana (Apr 29, 2010)

I think there is something called a renewable contract, where the contract is renewed automatically every year unless either party submits in writing intention to terminate it...
could be wrong though...


----------



## zin (Oct 28, 2010)

Tropicana said:


> I think there is something called a renewable contract, where the contract is renewed automatically every year unless either party submits in writing intention to terminate it...
> could be wrong though...


This is what my contract says and I believe this is standard. If you do not give 2 months notice and you are 3 months over your contract then the contract is automatically renewed for another year.


----------



## Moe78 (Oct 29, 2010)

I don't think you need 2 months notice. I think the landlord needs to give that but you can just not renew the contract or tell the landlord you're ending the contract in 30 days. Not sure though as tenancy contracts here are rather dodgy!


----------



## Mr Rossi (May 16, 2009)

Moe78 said:


> As for the blank cheque, sometimes you do crazy things for people you believe are your friends


Even so what part of a viable, logical or legitimate business involves a blank cheque?

If it was an investment then it wouldn't have needed guaranteed, investments are technically gambles, the risk is offset in the investors confidence in the business plan.

If it was a loan then surely they should have worked out some form of structured repayment plan, family friend of otherwise.


----------



## Bigjimbo (Oct 28, 2010)

Moe78 said:


> I don't think you need 2 months notice. I think the landlord needs to give that but you can just not renew the contract or tell the landlord you're ending the contract in 30 days. Not sure though as tenancy contracts here are rather dodgy!


Strictly speaking a tenant does need to give whatever notice is on the contract, otherwise the contract automatically renews on the previous terms. In reality this is rarely exorcised.


----------



## VADXB (Jun 4, 2009)

Mr Rossi said:


> Even so what part of a viable, logical or legitimate business involves a blank cheque?
> 
> If it was an investment then it wouldn't have needed guaranteed, investments are technically gambles, the risk is offset in the investors confidence in the business plan.
> 
> If it was a loan then surely they should have worked out some form of structured repayment plan, family friend of otherwise.


Though I could be wrong but from what I hear, you need to provide a "Blank" cheque to your local sponsor as a security cheque and this is something many business owners operating outside the free zone and require a local sponsor had to do.

Thinking about it, as you would know most of the expats who moved here before the 2009 crash did provide a security cheque to the banks when applying for credit cards. Though it is quite scary writing a blank cheque for so called security reasons, still people did it to get credit cards and other loans. 

With the benefit of hindsight, it is quite easy to criticise these things but it was a tough call back in 2006/2007 when you were establishing businesses in this region and when every business partner and expat you meet tells you "Oh, dont you worry about it..Thats just how it gets done here". 

I'm not saying that writing a blank cheque is justified (I never did and will never do it in the future) but just offering you a rationale as why people might have done it and perhaps they do deserve a little bit of sympathy.


----------



## Mr Rossi (May 16, 2009)

VADXB said:


> but just offering you a rationale as why people might have done it and perhaps they do deserve a little bit of sympathy.


You are very correct with all your points, it is easy to forget how things once were and how a "oh, don't worry about that" might have got you to do all kind of things that sound preposterous now.

Regardless, you still had to be aware of the risks, when we first came here it was still very much in the boom times (though not long to go) and upon arrival heard stories of sponsors and so called "business partners" ripping each other off left right and centre. In fact it seemed to go on more pre-recession as folk were less likely to chase up a loss as they had income from elsewhere and just let it go.


----------

