Sakina Muhammad Jan, 45, is charged with recklessly coercing her daughter Ruqia Haidari into a forced marriage, placing her in danger of death or serious harm between May 31 and November 9, 2019.
She has not entered a plea to the charge and is currently facing a three-day committal hearing in Shepparton Magistrates’ Court.
Mariyam Khan told the court her school friend Ms Haidari had told her she did not want to get married to Perth man Mohammad Ali Halimi with whom a marriage was being arranged.
Ms Khan said her friend thought her husband-to-be looked too old, but she was worried her mother would not accept that she did not want to marry him.
When Ms Khan spoke to Ms Muhammad Jan about the impending marriage, she told her that her daughter was not happy and that Halimi “wasn’t the last guy left”.
Ms Khan also spoke about how at henna night celebrations the night before the wedding Ms Muhammad Jan had asked her to tell her daughter to smile while she was on the stage with her husband-to-be.
“Her mother told me to tell Ruqia to smile or she is going to come to the stage and hit her … because people are saying ‘you’re not happy’,” Ms Khan said.
In a statement to police, Ms Khan said at Ms Khan’s wedding Ms Haidari told her she did not want to go back to Perth and that Halimi did not want her to because she was not interested in him and was not able to have sex with him.
“Ruqia told me that Mohammed had told her ‘if you come back to Perth I will send your dead body back to your mother’,” Ms Khan said in her statement.
“Ruqia also told me Sakina had said to her ‘don’t come back to us, we will only take back your dead body’.
“This is because it is shameful in our culture for a woman to leave her husband.”
Another witness, Zahra Haydar-Big, who met Ms Haidari while working as a bilingual support worker for Kildonan Uniting Care, told the court she had offered to speak to Ms Haidari’s mother for her but was told not to.
However, she did have a conversation with Ms Muhammad Jan asking that her daughter be allowed to stay engaged for longer and to let her start and finish university first.
Ms Haidari’s driving instructor Jennie Patterson and secondary school teacher Georgina Schofield also told the court how Ms Haidari had told them she did not want to get married.
Halimi was convicted in Western Australia’s Supreme Court of murdering Ms Haidari in January 2020 — about two months after they married — and sentenced to life in prison with a non-parole period of 19 years.
The hearing continues.
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