Page 1042 – Minivan News

DRP requests six month delay for general GST

Main opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) Leader Ahmed Thasmeen Ali has sent a letter to the President requesting a six-month delay to the introduction of a 3.5 percent Goods and Services Tax (GST) approved by parliament last month.

In his letter, the minority leader noted that according to parliamentary rules of procedure, only the government could submit tax legislation. He urged the government to delay the implementation of the GST to allow businesses enough time to prepare. The General GST is due to come into force on October 2.

Thasmeen argued that a number of citizens could be subject to legal penalties specified in the legislation if they were not provided sufficient information about registering and paying the new direct tax.

In a booklet handed out to media last month titled “DRP’s response to the government’s economic nuisance package,” the party noted that the General GST would affect small businesses such as cornershops, cafes and teashops.

The businesses would “need a lot of preparation” to maintain accounts, install “modern computer systems and hire accountants” as well as provide customer’s statements showing the GST percentage.

Morever, taxing “total value of business transactions” would not be possible with GST at zero percent for some items.

Considering the potential “administrative confusion” and the country’s heavy reliance on imports, the DRP argued that levying a customs duty at the entry point to the country was more effective.

President’s Press Secretary Mohamed Zuhair told Minivan News today that the government viewed the DRP as the main opposition party and “gives a high priority to their concerns.”

“But the President has been advised by financial experts that all taxes should be part of one network and it is not sensible to omit one tax for the whole system to work,” he said.

Zuhair noted that “people wanted to delay the introduction of political parties” in the past, adding that “we have lost 30 years without a tax system.”

In May, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) approved a three-year support programme after the government agreed to “a package of policy reforms that will help stabilise and strengthen the Maldives’ economy.”

Under the IMF programme, the government committed to:

Raise import duties on pork, tobacco, alcohol and plastic products by August 2011 (requires Majlis approval);
Introduce a general goods and services tax (GST) of 5 percent applicable to all sectors other than tourism, electricity, health and water (requires Majlis approval);
Raise the Tourism Goods and Services Tax (TGST) from 3.5 percent to 6 percent from January 2012, and to 10 percent in January 2013 (requires Majlis approval);
Pass an income tax bill in the Majlis by no later than January 2012;
Ensure existing bed tax of US$8 dollars a night remains until end of 2013;
Reduce import duties on certain products from January 2011;
Freeze public sector wages and allowances until end of 2012;
Lower capital spending by 5 percent

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Islamic Foundation files court case seeking repeal of Religious Unity Regulations

Religious NGO Islamic Foundation of the Maldives (IFM) has filed a case at the High Court requesting the court rule that the Religious Unity Regulations are inconsistent with the constitution.

Controversial new religious unity regulations were published in the government’s gazette last week, cracking down on extremist and unlicensed preaching of Islam in the Maldives.

Local media reported that prominent religious scholar Sheikh Ibrahim Fareed, who currently faces charges for allegedly violating the Religious Unity Act, filed the case in the High Court and spoke to the media outside the court.

Media reported Sheikh Fareed as stating that the regulation was inconsistent with the constitution as well as the Quran.

Fareed was quoted as saying that romantic thoughts, social talks and religious speeches were part of the fundamental right of freedom of speech as stated in the constitution.

Meanwhile, religious NGO Jamiyyathul Salaf and the religious council of the Adhaalath Party voiced opposition to the regulations.

Sheikh Fareed today told Minivan News that the regulation was “very” inconsistent with the Quran and the constitution.

“By God’s will next week I will request the High Court issue a court order to delay the implementation of the regulation until the court reaches to a conclusion on the issue,” Sheikh Fareed said. “The regulation was drafted by the Islamic Ministry and it pressured the government to publish it in the gazette.”

He said islanders of Miladhoo in Noonu Atoll have been protesting outside on the streets of the island today calling for the religious unity regulation to be amended.

Media Coordinator of the protest and Chairman of Miladhoo Island Council Hassan Gassan told Minivan News that the protest started at 4:15pm today.

“The protest is organised by the IFM Miladhoo Wing and a huge majority of the islanders have joined the protest,” he said. “We walked around the main streets of the island and stopped at the island harbor.”

He said protesters were calling for the resignation of Islamic Minister Dr Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari, and to amend the Religious Unity Regulations.

New religious unity regulations were published in the government’s gazette last week, cracking down on extremist and unlicensed preaching of Islam in the Maldives.

The regulations reflect the enforcement of the Religious Unity Act of 1994 and were originally put forward by the Islamic Ministry, but have undergone numerous drafts and revisions over the past year. The penalty for violating the regulations under the Act is 2-5 years imprisonment, banishment or house arrest.

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HarperCollins confirms Maldives not being erased from Times Atlas as global warming statement

The Maldivian government has written to the editor of the UK’s Telegraph newspaper seeking “clarification and apology” for a satirical article claiming that the Maldives was to be erased from the Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World as a statement on global warming.

The article, by climate skeptic James Deringpole, cited a fictitious spokesperson from Times Atlas as implying that the Maldives’ position on climate change was “a publicity stunt, cooked up by green activist Mark Lynas, to blackmail the international community into giving the Maldives more aid money while simultaneously trying to lure green Trustafarians to come and spend £1500 a night in houses on stilts with gold-plated organic recyclable eco-toilets made of rare earth minerals from China.”

In a letter to the Telegraph’s Editor, Tony Gallagher, Acting High Commissioner Ahmed Shiian wrote that “to suggest, even in satire, that the plight of our country in the face of sea-level rise is simply some kind of con-trick to raise guilt money from the international community is despicable and hurtful to all of us, whose country is indeed one of the most vulnerable on Earth to global warming.”

Shiian added that Delingpole’s “leaden attempts at humour” had already had “unfortunate political consequences in the Maldives”, after his invented quotes from a Times Atlas spokesperson “were reported as fact in the Maldives media, and the opposition party of the former dictatorship has used this to accuse the President of undermining the country and national pride.”

Minivan News yesterday contacted the publisher of the Times Atlas, HarperCollins, which confirmed that the story was bogus.

“Of course we have no plans to erase the Maldives, Tuvalu or major parts of Bangladesh from the next edition,” a spokesperson told Minivan News, also confirming that the spokesperson cited by Deringpole was not a HarperCollins employee.

“Like the rest of the piece, he is a fiction,” she said.

Major media outlets in the Maldives, including Haveeru, Miadhu and Sun Online, continued to carry the story this morning, although Haveeru had amended its version to reference “unconfirmed reports”.

The stories generated strong sentiment among the many who commented on it, with many blaming President Nasheed for the underwater cabinet meeting which had led to the Maldives “being wiped off the map”.

A senior source in the President’s Office told Minivan News that the story had stirred up strong sentiments and now the perception risked running ahead of the reality.

“It is hugely irresponsible journalism not to acknowledge when you’ve made a mistake. Standard procedure all over the world is to do a retraction,” the source said.

Editor of Sun Online and President of the Maldives Journalists Association (MJA), Ahmed Hiriga Zahir, told Minivan News that he had edited Sun’s story and was under the impression that it was genuine.

“I didn’t thoroughly check the original,” he acknowledged, “but I did read the Maldivian media. Why would the [UK] media report it [incorrectly]? I think the original media should correct it. If the Maldivian media reported it and they know it is not the truth, they should also correct it,” he added.

Press Secretary for the President, Mohamed Zuhair, said the government was approaching the Broadcasting Commission and the Maldives Media Council asking it “to insist the mainstream media be responsible, and not to take silly blogs as mainstream news.”

Zuhair said he suspected the media had “deliberately misinterpreted” the story to mislead the public and generate anti-government sentiment.

“Many of these outlets were the government organs of yesteryear, and many of their journalists have not reconciled themselves with the days when they were calling the current President a vagabond and a terrorist,” Zuhair said.

“Presenting this story as serious news is misleading, and people have been misled – they are calling up the morning radio programs concerned that the Maldives has been taken off the map. The media should be responsible and publish a retraction, but I doubt they will do it – you can wake up a person who is asleep, but you can’t wake up a person who is pretending to be asleep.”

MP for former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom’s new political party, the Progressive Party of the Maldives (PPM) Ahmed Mahlouf, yesterday sent out a mass text message informing people of the supposed decision to erase the Maldives from the map, blaming President Mohamed Nasheed for holding the underwater cabinet meeting and ”erasing the country, erasing religion and erasing the people.”

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Abandoned child legally assigned foster parents for first time in Maldivian history

The Family Court has assigned foster parents to a 10-month-old baby for the first time in Maldivian history. The child, who had been abandoned, was transferred from state care to a married couple on Sunday, September 18.

“This is the first time that non-biological parents have been given legal guardianship of a child in the Maldives,” said Ilham Mohamed, a local NGO worker familiar with the matter.

Mohamed said that foster parents previously risked the biological parents turning up to demand money and/or the child. “This example will make the process more secure,” she said.

The new foster parents will have the same legal rights given in adoption, except for the rights to consent to marriage and leave an inheritance.

Mohamed pointed out that in many cases where a father will not consent to his daughter’s marriage, the young couple requests and often receives court permission. She said the process usually takes between two and three months.

The couple’s lawyer, former Attorney General (AG) Aishath Azima Shakoor, told local media that the couple wanted to opt for their new daughter to inherit an equal share of their property. According to Mohamed, Maldivian law allows foster parents this option.

Shakoor recently told local media that the court had transferred the state’s legal guardianship of the child under Shari’a law to the couple, who have agreed in writing to protect and provide for the girl.

The Maldives did not provide services for abandoned children before the 1990s. Sources say that the number of abandoned children rose during that decade, possibly due to the allegedly higher rate of drug use among young adults at that time.

In 1992, the Ministry of Gender and Family established the Unit for the Rights of the Child (URC), now known as the Child and Family Protection Services (CFPS). Since then, the ministry maintains that the number of care-giving staff and institutions are unable to meet demand.

An Auditor General’s report dated 2009 reported 43 children at the state’s orphanage on Villingili, near Male. The report noted that the orphanage was understaffed and staff members were unable to provide sufficient care for children below the age of five. Most employees were not trained in child psychology, and there were no provisions for medical emergencies.

The orphanage on Male is currently over capacity and children are not segregated by age, said Mohamed.

Minivan News previously reported that Maldivian Family Law requires various next-of-kin be asked to care for abandoned children before the state assumes responsibility. But the process of identifying proper care-givers was reported long and difficult, and the Ministry of Family and Gender was regularly backed up with applications at the time.

The report also noted that adoption, as it is handled in the West, is illegal in Islam.

“Adoption in the Western style is not part of Islam,” explained Mohamed. “But fostering, or taking people into your care, is part of Islamic culture. It doesn’t really matter what name you use, foster or adopt, just so long as children have a safe place to live.”

Mohamed said she believes most orphanages have wait lists, and expects foster parenting to increase significantly.

“The couple that has been approved struggled to convince local authorities of their case. But now that this has been done once, it won’t be difficult for people to do it again.”

Mohamed noted that the struggle to legalize foster parenting began in the late 1990s, and calls the recent case a “very significant event.”

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ACC paid members’ phone bills illegally, finds audit report

Mobile phone bills of Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) members were paid out of the commission’s budget illegally, according to the independent institution’s audit report for 2010 made public yesterday.

The audit report published on the website of the Auditor General’s Office found that the bills of mobile phones given for office use were paid by the commission from April 2010 onwards if the amount did not exceed Rf 650 per month.

“Since according to article 16(a) of the Anti-Corruption Act salaries and allowances for commission members shall be determined by the People’s Majlis (parliament), we note that following the parliament’s Public Accounts Committee’s (PAC) response on March 30, 2011 to the Anti-Corruption Commission’s letter on March 16, 2011, [the commission] stopped paying the phone bills of members,” reads the audit report.

“The [PAC] letter told the commission to cease paying phone bills until the Public Accounts Committee reviews phone allowances of institutions whose salaries are determined by the People’s Majlis and informs [the commission of a decision].”

In addition, the audit report noted that unused funds left over after ACC trips were not properly recorded under the applicable budget code.

Moreover, reports of such trips were not filed within three working days of the end of the trip as stipulated by clause 5.13 of the state financial regulations.

An ACC spokesperson had not responded to Minivan News at time of press. However ACC Deputy Chair Muaviz Rasheed told newspaper Haveeru today that the mobile phones were used for office work and the ACC received authorisation to pay the phone bills from the Finance Ministry.

While a monthly limit of Rf 650 was set, Muaviz said that the amounts paid were below the limit for most months.

The audit report meanwhile noted that the ACC’s financial statement was prepared in accordance with international public sector accounting standards and “shows the commission’s financial status truthfully and accurately.”

Out of the Rf16.5 million (US$1 million) annual budget released to the ACC in 2010, the report noted that Rf12.4 million (US$800,000) was spent on salaries and allowances for employees. Over Rf778,000 (US$50,400) was meanwhile spent on training staff.

The ACC audit report for 2010 is the first report released by the Audit Office since 2009 following former Auditor General Ibrahim Naeem’s contentious dismissal by parliament in March 2010 over corruption allegations. After rejecting the President’s first nominee, Naeem’s replacement – current Auditor General Ibrahim Niyaz – was eventually approved in May this year.

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MDP requests special prayer for Palestinian statehood

The ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) has asked the Ministry of Islamic Affairs to recite a special prayer after the next Friday prayers to support the Palestinian bid for statehood.

In a letter to Islamic Minister Dr Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari, MDP Chairperson MP “Reeko” Moosa Manik said that the Palestinians have been deprived of their basic human right of sovereignty “for the past 60 years.”

A vote on the issue of Palestinian statehood is due to take place at the 66th UN General Assembly on Friday.

The Foreign Ministry has stated that the Maldives strongly supports UN recognition of Palestinian statehood, with Naseem advocating the position before the UN Human Rights Council following the announcement by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas that he will apply to the UN Security Council for full UN membership.

“Let us be clear, the Palestinian people have, like everyone else, the right to self-determination – the right to a state of their own. They have waited long enough for that most basic of rights. When the Palestinians present their case to the UN, the Maldives will stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them, and we call on all others to do likewise,” Naseem told the UN Human Rights Council.

Naseem has said the Maldives does not believe that UN recognition of Palestinian statehood will narrow the chances of a negotiated peace.

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Finance Ministry appeals for cooperation with cost-cutting measures

The Finance Ministry has appealed for cooperation from all state institutions to the government’s cost-cutting measures by not hiring additional staff, creating new posts or replacing vacancies.

A budget circular issued by the ministry on Sunday notes that expenditure on state employees accounts for 35 percent of government spending in the 2011 budget while 49 percent of government expenditure so far this year (excluding foreign loans and free aid) was on salaries and allowances.

“Lately a number of institutions have been requesting permission from the ministry to add new posts in 2011 and hire employees for vacant posts,” reads the circular signed by Finance Minister Ahmed Inaz. “However since the ministry believes that, considering the state of the budget, there is no space to add employees or fill vacant posts this year, the ministry urges cooperation for controlling the number of employees.”

As part of the government’s belt-tightening measures to curb expenditure, the circular notes, the Finance Ministry requires offices and state institutions to seek authorisation in writing for capital expenditure and overseas trips as well as repair and maintenance work.

The ministry had previously informed all state institutions to not create new posts or fill vacancies, the circular noted.

“In addition, posts of employees who leave their government jobs under the ministry’s “voluntary redundancy programme” has been abolished,” it added. “The ministry believes that as a result of this programme expenditure on employees out of the state budget will be controlled to an extent.”

The Finance Ministry recently revealed that the country’s fiscal deficit in 2011 reached Rf1.3 billion (US$84 million) in the first week of September.

The circular meanwhile noted that the government has pledged not to raise nominal wages until the end of 2012 under the staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

In May, the IMF gave preliminary approval for a three year economic programme in the Maldives, after the government agreed to “a package of policy reforms that will help stabilise and strengthen the Maldives’ economy.”

“In sum, this package of proposed policy reforms will help stabilize and strengthen Maldives’s economy, and the mission thus reached a staff-level agreement with the Maldivian authorities on a three-year economic program that could be supported by a new IMF lending arrangement,” reads an IMF press statement in May. “The agreement reached, however, remains subject to review by IMF management and approval of the IMF’s Executive Board, which could consider a program request from Maldives in July. It is anticipated that an approved program would encourage key donors to contribute additional financial support.”

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Faculty of Sharia Law to expel student wearing face veil

The only student wearing the face veil studying at the Faculty of Sharia Law will be asked to remove it during class or face being expelled if she refuses to do so, Dean of the Faculty of Sharia Law Dr Ibrahim Zakariyya Moosa has reportedly stated.

An online religious news website in the Maldives, ‘Islaameenoor’, reported the girl as saying that she was called to go to the office after class, whereupon Dr Zakariyya told her that it was not compulsory for Muslim women to wear the face veil.

Dr Zakariyya reportedly told the girl that studying was compulsory under Islam, and that if wearing the face veil obstructed her from studying, she should not wear it even if it was a Sunnah.

According to Islaameenoor, the girl responded that she did not wear the veil to create confusion about the religion, but to uphold the religion as much as she could, the paper reported.

Dr Zakariyya allegedly told her that he had no choice to allow something disallowed, and that she should not come to study wearing the face veil although she was able to come wearing a loose black hijab.

According to the paper, Dr Zakariyya told her that in different parts of the country terrorists had used the hijab to hide weapons, and that there was “no way to identify the sex of a person wearing the full hijab”.

Dr Zakariyya explained to her that there was no way the faculty could confirm that it was really her attending the exam if she wore the face veil, to which the girl replied that if the faculty was suspicious, female staff working in the faculty could remove her face veil and check.

Dr Zakariyya then told the student that there was an opportunity to secretly have headphones in her ear while doing the exams, which she said was possible even wearing the normal veil without covering the face.

When Minivan News attempted to contact Dr Zakariyya, the front desk at the faculty referred Minivan News to the Maldives National University. The Maldives National University referred Minivan News back to the faculty of Islamic Studies, which said it did not have the authority to comment.

Maldives National University Chancellor, also the former Education Minister Dr Musthafa Luthfy, also said he did not wish to comment on the matter.

Former State Islamic Minister Sheikh Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed, currently Dean of Islamic Studies at Villa College, said he had not heard of the matter and would not comment on it unless the reports had been officially confirmed.

Online newspaper ‘Sun’ meanwhile today reported Dr Zakariyya as confirming that the reports were correct, and he had advised a student wearing the face veil to remove it while coming to study.

He reportedly told the paper that the Faculty of Sharia Law would “take strict measures” next year in such cases.

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Satirical news blog dupes Maldives media

Maldivian media outlets this morning published as fact a satirical Telegraph news blog citing “unconfirmed rumours” that the 14th edition of the Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World will omit the Maldives, Tuvalu, “and major parts of Bangladesh” as a statement on global warming.

The blog post, written by climate change skeptic James Delingpole who describes himself as “a writer, journalist and broadcaster who is right about everything”, features comments by a “Times Atlas spokesman” David Rose.

In a UK press scandal this year, ‘David Rose’ was found to be a psuedonym used by left-wing Independent journalist and climate change writer Johaan Hari to edit his own wikipedia entry, advocate his own position and attack his critics.

Rose, who in Delingpole’s article holds “a doctorate in Cambridge in Climate Change and Sinking Islands Studies so I know what I’m talking about, and if you don’t believe me, ask my friend Johaan Hari who taught me everything I know”, acknowledges that it “may not be strictly geographically accurate to say the Maldives and Tuvalu will definitely have disappeared in about ten years time when our next edition appears.”

“But did you see that picture of the Maldives cabinet holding a meeting underwater? If the Maldives government says the Maldives are drowning, they must be drowning. And frankly I think it’s despicable, all those deniers who are saying it was just a publicity stunt, cooked up by green activist Mark Lynas, to blackmail the international community into giving the Maldives more aid money while simultaneously trying to lure green Trustafarians to come and spend £1500 a night in houses on stilts with gold-plated organic recyclable eco-toilets made of rare earth minerals from China. Why would a government lie about something as serious as climate change?”

Rose goes on to state that “I’m pleased to say that this is a view of the world shared by my colleagues at Times Comprehensive Atlas Of The World. They understand that maps based on accurately recorded geographical features belong in the Victorian age of child chimney sweeps. What we need now is maps that change the world, transforming into something which it isn’t actually yet but might be one day if we don’t act NOW!”

A spokesperson for HarperCollins, publisher of the Times Atlas, told Minivan News that “the piece in today’s Daily Telegraph is a satirical story. Of course we have no plans to erase the Maldives, Tuvalu or major parts of Bangladesh from the next edition of The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World. There is no one at HarperCollins called David Rose. Like the rest of the piece, he is a fiction.”

Meanwhile, Ahmed Mahlouf, MP for former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom’s new political party the Progressive Party of the Maldives (PPM), today sent out a mass text message informing people of the supposed decision to erase the Maldives from the map, blaming President Mohamed Nasheed for holding the underwater cabinet meeting and “erasing the country, erasing religion and erasing the people.”

Delingpole’s post was written in response to a recent press release by HarperCollins, publisher of the The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World, stating that global warming was “turning Greenland ‘green’”, and that cartographers had altered the maps to depict gradual melting of the icecaps.

In a statement yesterday, HarperCollins said the release did not reflect the content of the Atlas, and apologised for the release “which unfortunately has been misleading with regard to the Greenland statistics.”

“We came to these statistics by comparing the extent of the ice cap between the 10th and 13th editions (1999 vs 2011) of the atlas. The conclusion that was drawn from this, that 15 percent of Greenland’s once permanent ice cover has had to be erased, was highlighted in the press release not in the Atlas itself. This was done without consulting the scientific community and was incorrect. We apologise for this and will seek the advice of scientists on any future public statements. We stand by the accuracy of the maps in this and all other editions of The Times Atlas.”

Delingpole attended Christ Church college at Oxford, the same institution which earlier this week signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Maldives High Commission to the UK, to provide a postgraduate scholarship in environmental science to a Maldivian student.

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