As some know, I have changed my status in the military to stationary, and now after paying the بدل there is no more duties to worry about. Or so it seems, as recently, while meeting with some people, I was told that by law a person who pays is still subject to 6 months service.... ta da... but fortunately the law is not applied. Imagine what would happen if they did apply it. Lots of angry folks, and some more who will be excited to see it happen. Those who will be excited are the ones who can't pay for whatever reason, and those who tried and failed....
And of these who tried and failed, I will speak. Since the law was changed to allow Syrian citizens to re-challenge their health exam and then enter the process of بدل, or the monetary military waiver, lots of people have tried to cheat the examination committees in various ways. Some may succeed, and some may not. And these are examples of those who didn't make it (of course this is happening with the help of some not-so-straight-forward doctors):
- One guy has faked a surgical operation of his back for "disc problems" and brought films with him. Apparently his doctor made a skin incision without any additional thing and closed the wound, on purpose of course. He was caught and was handed to investigators.
- Another, with three of his brothers, got MRIs of the same sick person and changed the names on the copies. They were figured out and also investigated with.
- The other guy had 3 siblings who are deaf-mute and was easily able to act like them and be convincing, to the point that he fooled the examiner.
- One of the most things or diagnoses I heard being misused is: cardiomyopathy (اعتلال عضلة قلبية), can you imagine all this young generation affected with such a thing??
- But the best one is this doctor who is giving "mental retardation" labels to many people. They figured this out as one of the "mentally retarded" patients is the manager of a bank!!!Are you kidding me? A bank manager gets the mental retardation stigma for evading the military service??? I think he should have gone for the cardiomyopathy one.But in retrospect, I thought to myself: why should this be an awkward thing?? Aren't many managers and people in high official posts "relatively" mentally retarded for their positions?? I think they should think it over again.
I am glad I got a real medical problem to pave my way. عقبال العايزين