The Commonwealth has proposed a revised composition for the Commission of National Inquiry (CNI) into the circumstances surrounding February’s controversial transfer of power, the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) has claimed.
The MDP claimed the revised composition would include a further two representatives chosen by ousted President Mohamed Nasheed, and a experienced foreign judge provided by the Commonwealth, in addition to the existing three members appointed by President Dr Mohamed Waheed Hassan.
MDP MP and Spokesperson Hamid Abdul Ghafoor told media gathered on the steps of the Velanaage office building that following talks with Commonwealth Special Envoy Sir Donald McKinnon, the MDP expected the solution to be agreeable to all parties concerned.
“The people we are accusing of overthrowing the government in a coup d’état can’t be the same as the people investigating it,” Ghafoor said.
In its last statement in mid-April, the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG) challenged the independence of the commission as constituted by Dr Waheed, and gave the government a four week deadline to change it or face “further and stronger measures”.
Ghafoor noted that a delegation of three CMAG ministers who arrived shortly after February 7 described their investigation as inconclusive, and called for early elections.
“The government has said it will only hold early elections if it was proven to be a coup,” Ghafoor said. “We agreed, because we were ones who were desposed, so we were sure it was a coup.”
The announcement would “severely impact” the all party talks, Ghafoor noted, which the MDP has maintained are a “farce” after government-aligned parties challenged the legitimacy of the MDP’s appointed representatives.
“The [governing] coalition party representatives are not very united. They agree on their own legitimacy, but not on policy. They don’t have consistent positions,” he observed.
Ghafoor said under the proposed reconstitution of the commission, the deadline for the findings would be the end of June.
The proposed solution was “in the spirit of the CMAG [statements],” Ghafoor said. “I think today is a good day. If the investigation goes ahead as per the Commonwealth’s requirements, then we don’t see a problem. I’m confident we will soon be arresting Defence Minister Mohamed Nazim and Police Commissioner Abdulla Riyaz.”
The Commonwealth has not yet issued a formal statement on the proposal, however CMAG is expect to release one this week.
President’s Office Spokesperson Abbas Adil Riza said that government representatives in the talks would make a statement after they had concluded, as there was no final agreement yet to disclose to the media.
“The position of the government is that we have always been open to Commonwealth assistance,” he said.
The Press Trust of India (PTI) meanwhile reported President Mohamed Waheed as saying he was “terribly disappointed” with the Commonwealth, but was not in favour of leaving it.
“I don’t support the position that some people in Maldives have which is to withdraw from the Commonwealth. I don’t think that is the way to go. I think we need to be engaged,” Waheed told PTI.
Accusing the Commonwealth of “influencing” the national inquiry commission, Waheed suggested he was willing to accept the body’s terms.
“We have nothing to hide, I have nothing to hide. Therefore, we have agreed that we will agree on what is acceptable to Commonwealth and possibly an additional member on the panel,” PTI reported Waheed as saying.
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This is the only fair way to proceed. Sanity has broken out!
hahaha, fair way, its nasheeds way or the highway, maybe both, nasheed got what he wanted crybaby, Nasheeed said boohoo CMAG said dont charge me for any crime I might have committed while in power, even though I must have broken a lot of laws of not only our nation but Islam as well!!!
Just wait for the usual comments from the same old coup backers to swamp this page. They will hate this news!!!!! Justice will be done!
Waheed says "we have nothing to hide. I have nothing to hide" ... Then what, good sir, were you waiting for will now?? It's obvious to the most gullible person on this part of town or else where on eart that you have everything to hide and you were waiting it out, somehow hoping to get away. Wake up! It's not the medieval times!!! We live in a place whe we are globally aligned to respect those ethics of democracy!
Hopefully this happens for real
very little choice... waheed do the right thing and run!
I think we should insist that we have these hearings in public and not under closed doors
Transparency and sunlight is the best disinfectant!!
The best achievement so far in this crisis.Thanks to CW's persistence. Truth will hurt them so much but it will come one day.
Looks like Dr Waheed has come up for air from the dungeons of the Government of Unity!.
Well done, Dr Waheed!
Anni- CMAG should not be given two places and he should be given one and one to EU or India. This way it can have free and fair investigation.
In any case Anni resigned himself due to the circumstances surrounded him and those circumstances were created by himself and he himself wanted to bring a coup which luckily turns against him.
Anni can not do things against almightily Allah .
Anni can not do things against almighty Allah. Very true & clear indeed. Nor can Maumoon, Abdulla Gazi, Buruma Gasim, Nazim Sir, Yante, Gabbarey, Imran or Chika. "Visnaigen kuriah gendhavaa".
The proposed solution was “in the spirit of the CMAG [statements],” Ghafoor said. “I think today is a good day. If the investigation goes ahead as per the Commonwealth’s requirements, then we don’t see a problem. I’m confident we will soon be arresting Defence Minister Mohamed Nazim and Police Commissioner Abdulla Riyaz.”
The Majlis Clown Hamid counting the eggs before they are hatched
@mode... If you are rich, you can do what ever you want against Allah, because, in Maldives, only the poor get prosecuted for drinking, or for having sex out of marriage, because, the rich are too powerful to ever really be prosecuted! claiming Maldives Justice is Shariah Law, derived from Allah, from Islam, when the justice sysytem is so damned well corrupt, paints a really pathetic picture of Allah seems he is the One said to be in control! makes Allah look like a weak cowardly deity who bullies poor people around and bows too the rich!
Astagfillah!
Stop damaging the image of Allah through a corrupt ass system!
Lose the corruption, or drop the whole Allah thing, doing a massive injustice to the image of Islam!
A Muslim should be pushing for judicial reform, in order to not allow the Justice system to make a complete mockery of the Divine Principles!
Think about this. A sovereign country (Maldives) has to reverse its own executive decision when told by an international organization (Commonwealth)
This is how a country would be run in a globalized world. Yes, there are is no more sovereignty - just accept it.
People like Yameen and Maumoon should realize that their game is over. Welcome to the new age realities.
Hope it would be public as Lubna Ali says!
President Nasheed, to be fair, was never a cry baby, as some people here think he is!
He is persistent, and undoubtedly an achiever!
Congratulations President Nasheed!
Some learn lesson on the highways, some in the ally ways, and some; in the other ways!
But it is best to learn lessons the right way! Learn!
The Commonwealth, a system based loosely on an English interpretation of an ancient Roman ideal. To what extent is the Commonwealth a Hegemonic entity?
Gramsci defined Hegemony in a different way to convention. He said that hegemony is the way that the cultural super-structure (media, religion, political ideology, the interaction of these three etc...) is used to make the masses believe that what the powerful want is for the best interests of ALL.
He borrowed Marxist understanding of ideology, but believed the superstructure had greater agency than Marx believed it had.
I think that, the image of the Commonwealth striving to serve "ALL, objectively" would be tarnished in the eyes of even more Maldivians if they outrightly stated Waheed's Government was a coup...
Same time, if they genuinely believe it was a coup, they should state that!
I just hope that they strive to be as honest as possible.
Better late then never! Let's hope CMAG don't go wobbly now.
The only purpose of this whole exercise would be to make non-committal statements apportioning blame on both parties as well as a a bunch of commitments towards elections.
The Commonwealth needs to be ensure that the organization does not lose its credibility among the Maldivian people. Media reports that Kevin Rudd, a Nasheed sympathizer had lobbied the Commonwealth to put the Maldives on their agenda is somewhat damaging. The Commonwealth's failure to make any comments during the public arrest of two opposition figures, open and blatant attempts to influence the judiciary and the lock-up of an individual against international democratic norms is a glaring error that the Commonwealth should seek to correct.
Or else it just provides leeway for all parties concerned to question their sincerity regardless of the outcome. Right now the question on everyone's mind is whether the Commonwealth and its representatives would address the regrettable constitutional breaches carried out by Mohamed Nasheed. The petty argument here would be does anyone have to respect the Constitution if the President (Nasheed) himself could not uphold it?
But rather than go there I urge the Commonwealth to ensure that their engagement is in the best interests of the Maldivian public and not international lobby groups.
Hamid is being idiotic again. Just because they put another person into the commission is the statements of the people who have given statements, suddenly going to change?
No of course not. Waheed should have agreed to this long time back. MDP does not want an inquiry. That is why they refused in the Majlis, where they even have a majority in the 241 committee.
What will this so called inquiry achieve. If the inquiry finds that there was a coup what will follow next? Would Nasheed be reinstated? if so how? Would Dr Mohamed Waheed Hassan Maniku aka Handhuvaru Hassan Maniku ge "Mohamed Fulhu" step down? Would it lead to the prosecution of the coup leaders, if so by whom? and who would be the judges. Would the prosecutor general inititiate a prosecution based on the inquiry report. If it was a coup then the constitution cannot be applied if so what is going to be applied and by whom. Have the parties agreed on what to do in case the inquiry finds that it was in fact a coup in the absence of such an agreement the inquiry would be just useless.
"Sir" is often a title given to knighted Scottish Jew from time immemorial, going back to the days when the moribund Jews got a chance to fight along with Robert The Bruce against England in exchange of getting rights for Jews to live in Scotland. Most of the white Australians are of Scottish Jews decent!!! Imagine!! will they ever be fair and good to a true Muslim,but a puppet. Why not SAARC and Muslim League representation??
A.Ahmed on Tue, 15th May 2012 12:34 AM
"Why not SAARC and Muslim League representation??"
Just as I expected, you lot have as much memory as that of the poor little gold fish! How many SAARC monuments did you deface, destroy or vandalise? Have you forgotten your holy war on those monuments?
And after all that, are you calling for SAARC "representation"? Bloody fool! And who on earth is the "Muslim League"? In which division do they play?
I suggest Kutti Nasheed to be put in the inquiry commission so people can see how a really competent lawyer this guys is... full of B**** with his Malaysian Dato complex
@ Ahmed bin Addu bin Suvadheeb
Hey!! You dare to mock and jeer at Muslim Organizations haah?? Yellow fever infested lunatics will always have hard time to see the facts and to think straight.
It is in deed the acts of one eyed zealots, belonging to the Lunatic Yellow Fevers, which damage the relations we have with the SAARC and India. Your rightful abode is none than the HELL !!!
Let Mujey lead it and Shafeeu co-chair. let Anni one member acceptable to Commonwealth not Abbas Riza. Let Commonwealth one member observer status. (like a retired judge - a Singaporean)
Annis member shall not be any person from his former cabinet, nor a person who has already addresed this issue on MDP forums. Hassan Latheef, Aslanm, and Imthi already rejected by Commonwealth. Waheed and Abbas has no say in it.