Police have arrested five men for allegedly obstructing police while they were trying to open to the roads closed by Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) supporters in protest over the cancellation of presidential elections by police on Saturday.
In a statement police said they had opened all the roads that were closed by the MDP.
Police said that they had previously warned people who closed the roads to refrain from acting in a way that would disrupt transportation and people who walked on the roads.
Police noted that in some of the areas people were cooperative and removed the things they had used to block the roads after being warned.
However, police said people gathered on Majeedhee Magu in between Alikileygefaanu Magu and Chandhanee Magu did not listen to police warnings to open the roads, and that they had to forcibly open the road.
Two of the five were arrested on charges of obstructing police duty and objecting to police order, while another was arrested for hitting a police officer with a stone. Another was arrested for threatening police.
According to police, the officer who was hit by a stone was admitted to the hospital after receiving injuries to his leg. He has since been discharged.
MDP protesters started gathering on Majeedhee Magu near the Male’ City Hall building after the second attempt by the Elections Commission (EC) to hold presidential elections was obstructed by police on Saturday.
The first round of the presidential election, held on 7 September, was invalidated by the Supreme Court based on a report made by the police. The was filed submitted by the JP, with the court subsequently ordering that the first round be re-held before October 20.
With the ruling, the court also issued a guideline consisting of 19 points which the EC was obliged to comply with. The guidelines require the EC to obtain the signatures from all the candidates to ensure that they do not have any issues with the voter registration list.
While the EC was making the final preparations to hold the elections for the second time on October 19, the government aligned political parties refused to sign the voter lists as required by new Supreme Court guidelines.
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How can Police block people's right to vote but people cannot protest against violation of their rights!
The problem lies with that infernal Supreme Court ruling and the political disputes between our parties.
Try to look at it this way;
1) The disagreements between warring political parties have lead us to an impasse where both sides desire total annihilation of the other if elected this year. This has led to fear and mistrust on an unbelievable scale leaving all parties unwilling to become the opposition at any cost.
2)The dispute was forced on the Supreme Court whose Judges are subject to the whims and fancies of politicians after all. The parties in government can influence the majority of the bench so they forced out a ruling favoring them.
3) The Supreme Court ruling was designed in such a way that any party can delay the election by refusing to endorse the electoral roll.
4) As long as the Supreme Court ruling stands, acting against it would be contempt of court.
5) This led to a naturally clash with the EC whose mandate was in effect taken over by political parties and the government due to the Supreme Court ruling.
6) The clash meant that one institution was eventually going to come into conflict with the other. Given the circumstances, EC, by trying to uphold their mandate, crossed over boundaries set up by the heavily compromised Supreme Court.
7) EC acting against the ruling of the apex court gave the government the justification to frustrate all attempts to hold the polls by refusing to throw their support behind the EC.
8) As I have said before we must return to the source of this problem - POLITICAL DISPUTE - and find some kind of solution before going forward with this election.