Sri Lankan consul general passes away in Jeddah

JEDDAH — Sri Lankan Consul General Faizer Mackeen passed away at a local hospital Saturday morning. Funeral arrangements are being made, sources close to the diplomat said. Mackeen suffered a heart attack soon after he addressed an Independence Day ceremony at the consulate on Feb. 4 and was admitted to the intensive care unit of King Faisal Specialist Hospital. A politician belonging to the ruling United National Party, Mackeen was named the consul general in Jeddah in May last year. He hailed from Kalutara District in Sri Lanka›s Western Province. He was a former president of the Association of Licensed Foreign Employment Agencies (ALFEA), a corporate body constituted under the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment Act of 1985. He was also a member of the advisory council to the minister of foreign employment. An ardent social and welfare worker, Mackeen was appointed a trustee of the Henamulla Jumma Masjid in 1983 by the Department of Mosques and Muslim Charitable Trust. In 1978, he became the youngest person to be appointed a Justice of the Peace by the Ministry of Justice. He had an unblemished record as a businessman with wide experience in many sectors.