Is it valid to waive the debt of a person in financial difficulty and count it as zakah?

The questioner : The questioner says: I lent money to a friend of mine, and he was unable to repay it, and he is poor. Is it valid for me to make that part of the zakah and waive it from him with the intention that it is his zakah?

The Shaykh : It is not valid for a person to waive any part of a debt from a person in financial difficulty and count it as zakah. The Shaykh al-Islam (may Allah have mercy on him) said: A debt does not suffice as zakah on the body without any disagreement.
And this is clear, because the one who pays off a debt from the body is like the one who pays out the bad in place of the good, or the excellent. Because the creditor is a lost cause, and the money in your hand is in your hand under your control. For example, if you have one hundred thousand riyals, what is its zakah? Two hundred. Four months, two hundred and fifty.
Two thousand and five hundred, yes, one hundred thousand, two thousand and five hundred. A poor man has two thousand and five hundred, so I said, "O so-and-so, what is in your debt?" It is his zakah. Did I pay out like the money I have? No, I waived a debt, and the money I have is in my hand, I dispose of it, and this also leads to the fact that whenever we are unable to pay debts, what do we do?
We make it the zakah and we do not pay anything. Then, in zakah there is taking and giving , and in waiving a debt there is no taking and no giving. The summary of the answer is that it is not valid to waive any part of a poor man's debt and count it as zakah. This is the summary.