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Police confirm Hulhumale’ collision death

Police have confirmed the death a 29-year old man yesterday after a motor bike he was riding reportedly collided with a pick-up truck on the island of Hulhumale’.

Police told Minivan News that the man, identified as Abdulla Saeed, died late last night after a bike he was riding along with a fellow passenger reportedly collided with a truck on the island’s main street.

Police officials told Minivan News that they were currently not sure of the speed either of the vehicles were travelling at when they collided, but claimed that no one else involved in the incident was thought to have sustained serious injuries.

Following the collision, police said that Saeed was taken to Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital (IGMH) in Male’.

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Public outrage in Addu prompts “Stop Abuse” vehicle rally

A vehicle rally with the slogan “Stop Abuse” took place in Addu City yesterday in the wake of public shock and outrage over the brutal rape of a 74 year-old woman in Hithadhoo last week.

Haveeru reports that local NGOs, businesses and state enterprises participated in the rally across the interconnected islands of the southernmost Seenu Atoll. While Housing Minister Mohamed Aslam along with some MPs also took part, Haveeru notes that public participation was low.

According to the Child Protection Services Centre in Hithadhoo, 237 cases of child abuse and 58 cases of domestic violence have been reported since the centre was established.

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Government income must be doubled, says President

Government income has to be doubled to create fiscal space for increased capital expenditure and investment for development opportunities, President Mohamed Nasheed said in his radio address yesterday.

Speaking on the cabinet decision last week to incentivise voluntary redundancy in the civil service, President Nasheed reiterated that facilitating more attractive and higher paying employment opportunities for civil servants and government employees remains “a major goal for the government.”

“Development opportunities are going to be very limited if a large part of state revenue is recurrent expenditure,” he said. “We have to increase capital expenditure. The best way is to exponentially increase government income.”

While revenue was increasing year by year, Nasheed continued, current levels of annual income have to be “doubled” to make fiscal space for capital investments.

“It will take time for the state to reach that level,” he added. “It is necessary for the government to maintain recurrent expenditure at a certain level to reach [the goal]…The government’s purpose, or objective, is to find ways for employees to improve their standard of living.”

Under the scheme launched by cabinet on Tuesday, civil servants and government employees will be eligible for one of four retirement incentive packages: no assistance, a one time payment of Rf150,000 (US$11,700), a payment of Rf150,000 and priority in the small and medium enterprises loan scheme (for those 18-50 years of age), or a lump sum of Rf 200,000 (US$15,600) and priority in government training and scholarship programmes (for those 18-40 years of age).

Government employees above the age of 55 who retire voluntarily will be given the same benefits as those released by the Civil Service Commission (CSC) at the mandatory retirement age of 65.

The deadline to apply for the programme with the Finance Ministry is May 31, 2011.

Austerity battles

In August 2009, the government’s decision to implement austerity measures to alleviate the crippling budget deficit – including unpopular pay cuts of up to 15 percent for civil servants – was met with protests and fierce resistance from opposition parties and the CSC.

President Nasheed announced at the time that the government planned to halve the 32,000-strong civil service by 2011 through redundancies and transfer of employees to corporations.

While the President stated that the civil service should be composed of no more than 18,000 well-paid and qualified staff, CSC Chair Mohamed Fahmy told Minivan News last week that the commission currently has 19,000 permanent staff.

At the height of a protracted legal dispute between the CSC and government last year, the parliament-appointed independent commission was accused of attempting to topple the government and “plunge the Maldives into chaos.”

International organisations such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank meanwhile insist that reckless expansionary fiscal policies from 2004 onward that saw doubling expenditure on salaries between 2007-2009 crippled the economy.

“The Maldives faces the most challenging macroeconomic situation of all democratic transitions that have occurred since 1956,” read a World Bank report in March 2010.

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MMA Governor meets Finance Minister to discuss dollar shortage

Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) Governor Fazeel Najeeb met Finance Minister Ahmed Inaz last week to discuss the policy measures taken to alleviate the dollar shortage and determine what additional efforts could be undertaken to resolve the problem.

According to an MMA press statement on Thursday, Najeeb and Inaz agreed that given the continuing scarcity of dollars, “the problem of partiality by some to transactions with dollars instead of rufiyaa is tied to the dollar shortage.”

“It was therefore decided to go forward by consulting the business community about the issue,” it adds.

Deputy Governor Aishath Zahira, State Minister Ahmed Naseer and MMA technical staff also participated in the meeting.

Local media meanwhile reported a sharp rise in the wholesale prices of a number of commodities last week, ranging from powdered milk to areca nuts. Following the government’s decision earlier this month to replace the fixed exchanged rate with a managed float of the rufiya within a band of 20 percent of the 12.85 peg, newly-appointed Finance Minister Inaz told press that he expected the economy to stabilise within three months.

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Police arrest three suspects in burglary case

Police arrested three men Thursday on suspicion of stealing a safe with over Rf800,000 (US$62,250) in cash and jewellery from a house in Maafanu ward of Male’.

Haveeru reports that the third suspect, Ahmed Muaz, municipality register number 8499, was found Thursday night hiding in his girlfriend’s bathroom.

A police media official said that officers at the scene broke the bathroom door after Muaz refused to come out.

Muaz was arrested in connection with the burglary of a safe containing US$38,000 and Rf30,000 (US$2,330) in cash along with expensive watches and jewellery. The safe was stolen from the third floor of a Maafanu residence.

Jaufar Mohamed, 29, M. Medhuriya, and Ahmed Riyaz, 29, M. Hasthy, were meanwhile taken into custody before police issued a public search notice for Muaz.

Police revealed that one of the suspects, Jaufar Mohamed, had previously been sentenced to jail and that efforts were underway to determine how or why he was released.

Meanwhile the Criminal Court revealed that a man brought before the court yesterday for assaulting a shop owner after threatening to kill him had previously been sentenced to life imprisonment.

Court records showed that Ismail Waheed, G. Sundance, had been convicted for possession of 25 packets of drugs.

The court ordered police to keep the repeat offender in custody for 15 days and to hand him over to the penitentiary department within that period.

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MMA launches dollar reference at Rf 14.75

The Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) has published a dollar reference exchange rate of Rf 14.75, in an effort to give an approximate determination of the value of the currency.

Currency exchangers are permitted to sell dollars within a 20 percent band of the pegged rate of Rf 12.85, after the government launched a managed float of the rufiya earlier this month. Rf 14.75 is roughly the value of exchange on the black market prior to the managed float.

Banks are required to submit their daily rates to the MMA.

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“Clear evidence of crimes against humanity”: Maldives suspends diplomatic ties with Libya

The Maldives has suspended diplomatic ties with the Libyan government as Western powers increase military pressure on President Muammar Gaddafi’s regime.

“Following the recognition of the TNC, the suspension of diplomatic relations with the pro-Gaddafi regime is based on the continuing deteriorating human rights and humanitarian situation in Libya, and increasingly clear evidence that the Gaddafi regime is guilty of crimes against humanity and war crimes,” the Maldives Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The statement came after the US accused Gaddafi of using human shields and cluster bombs against his own population in the city of Misata, in some of the fiercest fighting of the civil war so far.

At least 10 civilians were killed on Wednesday, along with British photojournalist Tim Hetherington and American photographer Chris Hondros.

A bombing attack on Gaddafi’s compound in Tripoli yesterday meanwhile caused three causalities, after NATO jets targeted a bunker underneath a car park.

France, Italy and Britain this week authorised the deployment of military advisors to assist the ill-disciplined rebels in overthrowing Gaddafi’s government, despite earlier reluntance to put ‘boots on the ground’ in the stricken country.

US President Barack Obama has meanwhile authorised the use of drone aircraft in Libya. A NATO official this week told the UK’s Guardian newspaper that the drones would allow the identification of individuals even in crowded urban environments, allowing for more precise airstrikes.

After France and Qatar, the Maldives was the third country to recognise the Transitional National Council, the Benghazi rebels’ representative body.

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Step-father accused of abusing three step-daughters

A Lhaviyani Naifaru man has been accused by his wife of abusing her three daughters, aged three, eight and nine.

Speaking to Sun Online on her way back to her home island, the woman recounted how she confronted her husband when she found him kneeling naked in front of her sleeping daughters one night, but he had denied the accusations.

However upon questioning her daughters she came to know the abuse has been going for the duration of their three-month old marriage, prompting her to flee to Male’ and report the abuse to police.

Doctors have confirmed that the three girls sustained varying levels of injuries in the abuse, she said, while the three-year-old is suffering urinary problems because of the abuse.

Read full story here (in Dhivehi).

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Deputy speaker would “welcome” heightened transparency in the Majlis

Deputy Parliamentary Speaker Ahmed Nazim has claimed that he would welcome moves to promote transparency in the People’s Majlis, such as revealing the financial assets of MPs to the public, but added similar commitments would also be needed from the country’s judiciary and executive.

Speaking to Minivan News earlier this week, Nazim, who is also a serving member of the People’s Alliance (PA) party and the Majlis’ Public Accounts Committee, said he would “fully support” any initiative to improve the image of parliament such as providing details of the property and assets of MPs. However, the deputy speaker said he believed that the appointment of an auditor general, a position that has been vacant since March 2010 when Ibrahim Naeem lost a parliamentary no-confidence motion by 43 votes to 28, was needed to oversee such a process.

The claims were made as debate over whether MPs should publicly declare details of their assets and income was found to have reached an impasse, with opinion divided in the Majlis over whether doing so was a constitutional necessity.

The issue had also been raised by the political NGO, Transparency Maldives, which claimed that it was having difficulties in getting details on the assets and financial status of MPs despite parliament showing a generally more open attitude to supplying information.

The NGO, which operates a project called Parliament Watch alongside the Maldivian Democracy Network, believes that the right of the public to know the financial details of their elected representatives in the Majlis was “in the spirit” of the constitution. Transparency Maldives added that it believed that transparency within the actions and decision making of parliament had nonetheless improved in recent years despite possible concerns about MP finances.

Although the decision for public declarations of MPs’ financial statements was rejected this week, parliament also failed to agree to two additional recommendations that financial statements should be released only under a court order or to the public upon investigations by state institutions.

On Tuesday (April 19), Nazim in his capacity as deputy speaker of the Majlis, said the matter had been declared “void” on the basis that neither proposal was accepted by MPs, but he added that parliament’s Secretary General had sought counsel on the matter and would go ahead according to the “rules of procedure”.

Speaking before the vote, Nazim said that the issue had been sent to parliament by the Majlis’ secretary general over concerns about an isolated issue raised by the country’s Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) in requiring the financial statements of one unidentified MP.

Under present standing orders that outline parliament procedure, the deputy speaker claimed that sitting MPs were required to provide information to the Majlis by the end of October each year detailing their annual finances between the twelve months from May 29 to May 28.

Nazim said that amidst the ensuing debate over whether these statements should be made freely available to the public, the decision to do would definitely serve to “improve the image of parliament.”

While provisionally welcoming the initiative, Nazim claimed that he believed the Majlis would only public release details of their financial status alongside a similar commitment by judges and senior cabinet ministers.

“It would be for the auditor general to collect this [financial] information from cabinet ministers, judges and government members,” he said, accepting that the position had been vacant for more than 12 months.

“No [financial] information has been put into the public domain, once this happens the Majlis would consider following suit.”

Presidential Press Secretary Mohamed Zuhair told Minivan News that ultimately, the decision on whether to make the financial statements of MPs available to the public was down to parliament itself and not related to the government.

“It all depends on how transparent they [parliament] wish to be,” he claimed. “There are opportunities to be accountable, yet holding back on these details might lead to allegations [of possible corruption].

When asked whether cabinet member were themselves considering or already required to reveal details of their earnings and assets, Zuhair added that the issue related to a very different kind of social contract that they were bound to.

“Government employees are banned from working in the public sector or within any positions that might create a conflict of interest,” he added.

Aiman Rasheed, Projects Coordinator for NGO Transparency Maldives, claimedthat MPs were generally operating in a much more transparent manner during the current parliament.  However, he added that while parliamentarians were not required to supply their financial statements to the public, choosing to do so would be more in the spirit of the constitution.

Through its work on the Parliament Watch project, Rasheed claimed that at present NGOs like Transparency Maldives were finding it very difficult to know which MPs submitted their financial statements to the Majlis by the required deadline of October, with requests for a detailed list of members still not being met.

“There is obviously a lot of discomfort about this in the Majlis,” he said. “But for the most part, documents [relating to MPs] are available. As far as we are concerned this parliament is really open.”

Despite welcoming possible improvements in the transparency of the Majlis, Rasheed said that the Parliament Watch project would be releasing a report in the next few months detailing its findings in trying to bring greater scrutiny to parliamentary records in relation to members’ attendances and work rates.

However, amidst the debates over public accountability in the Majlis, a number of MPs have raised criticisms of the role of media in shaping public perceptions of parliament and its work.

(Maldivian Democratic Party) MP “Reeko” Moosa Manik said this week that while he agreed with the constitutional principle of publicly declaring assets and wealth, it was not an advisable time to do so in “today’s political atmosphere.”

The MDP parliamentary group leader remains embroiled in an acrimonious feud with private broadcaster DhiTV, owned by business magnate “Champa” Mohamed Moosa.

Dhivehi Qaumee Party (DQP) MP Riyaz Rasheed concurred with Moosa, claiming that parliament should be concerned about concerted efforts by some media outlets to “disgrace and humiliate MPs.”

“This is not being done by DhiTV’s owner or its management, we know that now,” he said. “But previously we believed that it was planned and carried out by the management there. But that is not the case.”

Echoing a claim made by several MPs in past weeks, Riyaz alleged that unsuccessful candidates for parliament and their family members or associates were behind hostile media coverage of parliament.

“In truth, when the financial status of MPs is made known, some MPs will be worried and others will embarrassed,” said minority opposition People’s Alliance (PA) MP Abdul Azeez Jamal Abubakur.

“That is, those who have a lot of money might be very worried and those who do not will be embarrassed. Therefore, at a time when our status is being revealed in the media, I don’t accept at all that these facts should be available to just anyone.”

Independent MP Mohamed Nasheed meanwhile argued that MPs should not shirk from their constitutional responsibilities by blaming the media. “We will answer in the media to the things said in the media,” he said.

Along with debates over accountability, Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) MP Dr Abdulla Mausoom claimed yesterday that despite the cancellation of a scheduled meeting in the Majlis’ main chamber , work was still ongoing in the parliament, which he believed was playing its part in pushing legislation to allow law enforcement officials to deal with violent crimes, despite certain “public perceptions” to the contrary.

The opposition party MP claimed that parliament was stepping up its workload to ensure the government, as the country’s executive branch, had the right powers and capabilities to uphold the law.

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