Author: Ahmed Naish

The main opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) has refuted claims by President Mohamed Nasheed that the former government seized property and assets of former President Ibrahim Nasir.

At a press conference today, DRP Spokesperson Ibrahim “Mavota” Shareef said it was proven in court that Nasir misappropriated state funds.

“The court made a valuation of those funds and took his property legally as compensation,” he said, adding that Nasheed was misleading the public on the issue.

He added the head of state making such statements was not in the public interest.

Although Nasir was found guilty of embezzlement, he continued, the former government gave back his home, Velaanage, for free.

“[But] Nasir announced that he would sell the house. When he made the announcement, the government requested that he sell it to the government instead of selling it to a member of a public,” he said.

Shareef said he worked at the property claims division of the court that handled Nasir’s case and it was revealed that he had developed resorts from government funds.

The former government did not create a commission to investigate Nasir, he said.

“It was proven in court that Velaanage, many resorts under Ibrahim Nasir’s name and many plots in Male’ were bought from state funds,” he said. “If these things are given back today, there won’t be any assets left for the government.”

In his weekly radio address on Friday, President Nasheed paid tribute to Nasir with the first anniversary of his death approaching. 

One year ago today, Nasir’s body was flown back from Singapore where he had been living in exile for 30 years and given a state burial with full honours.

The president said Nasir’s “honour and dignity” was damaged, different stories were told about him in the past 30 years and his property was seized.

“I am saying his property has been appropriated because the government took Ibrahim Nasir’s house, Velaanage,” he said. “And the government has now constructed a large building there. Velaanage is the ancestral home of that family. The Velaanage family is the most ancient and oldest family in the country.”

He added the family’s genealogy went back at least 700 years and Velaanage has been in the family for that period.

Shareef said DRP condemned the president indicating that he wanted to give a property of the state back.

He added the property was not registered to former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom or his family members, but as a property of the government.

The president said it would give him great pleasure to name the office complex in Velaanage in Nasir’s honour and put up official documents of Nasir’s reign for public viewing.

“That way, people will know how things went on during his rule, how he ruled and how he made decisions,” he said.

The DRP spokesperson said the party did not object to naming the office building in Nasir’s honour, but would not support giving it back “for a third time”.

The party would welcome releasing documents from Nasir’s government, he said.

“The main thrust of my argument is that while there are important social, economic and health problems, instead of taking measures to deal with it, the government is focusing on things done by the former government,” he said.

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The opposition Dhivehi Qaumee Party (DQP) filed a civil lawsuit against the finance ministry on Tuesday for failing to respond to a letter requesting information about expenditure.

The party are suing under articles 29 and 61(c) of the constitution, both of which relate to freedom of information except in circumstances where it is declared to be a state secret. 

“It’s the government responsibility. We are a party asking but even if it’s an individual, the government can’t ignore these things,” said DQP Secretary General Abdullah Ameen, adding the party was still awaiting the court’s acceptance notice.

In their letter sent in June, the party asked for information about official state trips abroad by senior officials of the finance ministry, including Finance Minister Ali Hashim and State Minister Ahmed Assad, up until 23 June.

The party questioned whether President Mohamed Nasheed had secured any of the US$359 million he said would be needed by the government in their first three months of power. 

Following his election, Nasheed said he would raise the funds within 20 days of coming to power, the party claimed. The DQP further requested a date by which the full amount would be obtained.
Elsewhere in their letter, the party asked the ministry for details of the employees of Gulhifalhu Industrial Zone, Gan Airports Company and Southern Utilities and their salaries as well as the value of the companies and copies of their regulations. 

Ameen said the DQP had sent letters to all government companies requesting information. “The government is trying to reduce the pay cut and all necessary expenses so before we criticise the government we have to know how much they are spending,” he said.

In August, the government introduced a raft of austerity measures to alleviate the budget deficit. These included a pay cut of up to 20 per cent for all civil servants, sparking controversy among opposition quarters. 
In their letter, the DQP also asked for a list of people who had been given cars by the government and details of their vehicles. 

Ameen said while some ministries had responded to the party’s requests for information, the finance ministry has been “reluctant”.

Speaking to Minivan News today, Assad said, “We will have to be answerable to the courts if the courts decide there’s a case to look into.”

President’s Office Press Secretary Mohamed Zuhair was unavailable for comment at the time of going to print.

In October, the DQP quit the coalition government and went into opposition, citing the government’s failure to bring about the change promised during last year’s presidential election as the reason.

“There hasn’t been any kind of negotiations or consultations or a policy of mutual advice since we joined the party,” said Dr Mohamed Jameel who was dismissed as minister for civil aviation and communication in May.

The DQP has had a rocky relationship with the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party since the start of the government, culminating in the party leader Hassan Saeed’s departure from government on its hundredth day in power.

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Contracts were signed today to establish transport networks in the Upper North and Upper South Provinces with high speed ferries.

At a ceremony at Dharubaaruge, two contracts for 50 years each were signed with Trinus-CAE Holdings Pvt Ltd, a joint venture between a Maldivian company and a South African company.

Speaking at the ceremony, Economic Development Minister Mohamed Rasheed said a transport network was essential for national development.

In the past, he said, economic development was concentrated around the capital Male’ and nearby atolls.

“Our tourism industry especially expanded in the region of the capital island,” he said. “The reason was that transport facilities had not been introduced to our country.”

The absence of a nationwide transport network hampered the development of the domestic economy, he said.

Rasheed said the establishment of regional transport networks would facilitate the mobility of labour and transport of goods necessary for businesses to prosper.

The Upper North includes Haa Alif, Haa Dhaal and Shaviyani atolls, while the Upper South Province includes Gaaf Alif and Gaaf Dhaal atolls.

“The difference between this agreement and other transport agreements that we’ve signed is that this is for a joint venture company,” he said, adding he hoped the South African company would be able to build ferries suited for Maldivian seas as soon as possible.

Maizan Ahmed Manik, state minister for transport, told Minivan News the fees for the service will be between Rf10 and Rf50 “up and down” and the ministry will provide terminals.

“They will be given 50-bed tourist facilities from each province,” he said.

The entire project will cost US$400 million over 50 years. 

Ferry services have begun in the Mid-South Province, while they are scheduled to begin in the South Province on 24 November and South Central Province the following day.

Agreements are expected to be signed for the remaining provinces on 30 December.

From 11 September to 11 November, 18,700 people have used the ferry service offered by Dhoni Services in the Mid-South Province, which include Thaa and Laamu atolls.

Speaking at the ceremony, Ismail Samih Ahmed, managing director of Trinus, said engines and ferries designed by the company’s partner Cape Advanced Engineering (CAE) were used across the world.

Samih said the company did not intend to provide the ferry service with dhonis. “We have designed special high speed ferries to provide transport services in these two provinces.”

He added the rough seas and harbours of the provinces were taken into account in designing the vessels.

“We have also considered the environment in designing the ferry,” he said, adding it was designed to use biodiesel in the future.

The ferries are being built in South Africa now and should be introduced to the country next year, he said.

But, he added, temporary services with dhonis will be introduced in the meanwhile.

Mohamed Hunaif, state minister for the Upper North Province, said he constantly received calls from people awaiting the introduction of the services.

Since the islands in the province were far apart and travel was expensive, he added, people would rejoice at the signing of the contracts today.

In his remarks, Umar Jamal, state minister for the Upper South Province, said the absence of affordable public transport was one of the “five pillars of slavery” that had shackled development.

“Today we’re destroying one of those pillars,” he said.

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Former Attorney General Azima Shukoor has commended the police for locating the underage concubine yesterday and urged media to protect her identity.

Local media reported yesterday that police raided a house in Male’ and placed the pregnant 17-year-old girl under their protection.

“I believe the society has to give her the protection as she is under 18 years of age,” she said Azima, speaking to press today. “I am saying this because I’ve seen her address revealed in the news media.”

She added revealing the girl’s identity would compromise her future and make others in similar circumstances reluctant to come forward.

Yesterday, daily newspapers reported that unnamed sources had confirmed that the girl was found based on records from Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital (IGMH).

Azima said she gave information to the police and HRCM for their investigations, adding she believed police had acted very professionally.

In September, President Mohamed Nasheed asked the relevant authorities to investigate reports of an underage concubine being kept for sex by religious extremists in the Maldives.

The report first hit the headlines when at a DRP rally Azima spoke about an article she had read on blogger Hilath Rasheed’s website about a young girl who had been taken to IGMH.

The doctor treating the girl suspected she had been sexually abused. After questioning her guardian, the doctor was told the girl was a jaariya or concubine.

Since then the police and the HRCM have carried out investigations to locate the girl.

For their investigation HRCM visited IGMH and requested details of underage girls who had taken pregnancy tests at around the time the concubine was reported to have attended the hospital.

It was further reported yesterday that the girl was the sister of a man sentenced to jail for clashing with police at Alif Alif Himandhoo during a crackdown on an independent prayer group on the island.

Both police and the HRCM said today their investigations into the reports of underage concubines are still ongoing.

A police media official said he could not confirm the raid yesterday or whether the girl was in custody.

Aishath Afreen Mohamed, complaints officer at the HRCM, said the commission has asked police about the media reports.

Azima said underaged girls who were abused often believed that they had committed a sin.

“Counsellors have to talk to them for a long time before they believe they haven’t done anything wrong,” she said, adding the victims were worried about being ostracised.

Azima said the issue should not be politicised and it was unfortunate that the Islamic ministry had said the reports of concubines were rumours spread to bring Islam into disrepute.

“I spoke about this because it was an inhumane and illegal act that someone has committed,” she said.

At a press conference in October, Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed, state minister for Islamic affairs, was critical of the HRCM for asserting religious extremists were keeping underage concubines without solid evidence.

Shaheeem said he did not believe the reports were true.

Azima said today the investigations would have progressed satisfactorily and without too much media attention if the Islamic ministry had not made such statements.

She added politics and child abuse should not be mixed.

Azima said she was working on other disturbing cases of child abuse.

The former attorney general said she was in the process of registering an NGO with former MP Aneesa Ahmed to target sexual violence against women and girls.

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The Maldives slipped 15 places on the corruption perception index since last year and continues to rank below Sri Lanka and India in the region, global corruption watchdog Transparency International (TI) said in a report released this week.

The Indian Ocean archipelago scored 2.5 on a scale of zero to 10, with zero indicating high levels of corruption and 10 very low. The score is down from 2.8 in 2008 and 3.3 in 2007, signalling worsening levels of perceived corruption.

A TI analysis of the region concluded that major political upheaval in the Maldives and the passage of political reforms over the past year had not been entirely smooth.

Last August, the Maldives ratified a new constitution that established separation of powers and a bill of rights. This was followed by the country’s first-ever multi-party presidential election, which saw incumbent President Mohamed Nasheed unseat Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, Asia’s longest-serving ruler.

In its analysis, TI further noted that a number of human rights abuses and corruption cases have been exposed since last year.

In 2008, Gayoom appointed an independent auditor general who has since published over 30 audit reports detailing corruption in state institutions. Now in opposition, Gayoom’s party, the Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party and its coalition partner, People’s Alliance, have rejected the reports and the auditor general as biased.

“It’s a perception of corruption levels so what would have happened is that in 2008 there was a lot of corruption cases that have been unearthed so that means the corruption perception would have increased. There was not necessarily more corruption,” said Thoriq Hamid, project co-ordinator at Transparency Maldives.

Mohamed Zuhair, president’s office press secretary, told Minivan News today that the decline was most likely because the Maldives was experiencing transition.

“If you covered it in other countries where there was regime change, the same statistics would happen mainly because there was been a flurry of activity at the end of the last regime to cover up what had been going on,” he said.

Zuhair added information about corruption has become available for the first time, noting a number of independent institutions which directly or indirectly deal with corruption under the new constitution.

These include the anti-corruption commission, the police integrity commission and the judicial services commission. “All these commissions need to speed up their work and become strengthened,” he said.

Zuhair further pointed to the government’s efforts to document corruption. In May, President Mohamed Nasheed established a commission to investigate the allegations in the auditor general’s reports, whose activities the opposition have called a “witch-hunt”.

The CPI focuses on corruption in the public sector and is prepared using surveys asking questions relating to the misuse of public power for private benefit.

TI gathered data from four sources and covered both 2008 and 2009. The sources were the Asian Development Bank, World Bank, the country risk service and country forecast by the Economist Intelligence Unit and the global risk service by IHS Global Insight.

One of the purposes of the CPI is to offer a the views of businesspeople and experts who make decisions about trade and investment.

Other countries in the Asia-Pacific region that saw a decline in their scores include Malaysia, Nepal and Afghanistan while Bangladesh, Japan, Tonga and Vanuatu saw their scores significantly rise.

Regionally, the Maldives ranks 23 out of 32 countries while globally it ranks 130 out of 180 countries.

According to TI, the global financial crisis and political change in many countries last year revealed defects in financial and political systems as well as failures in policy, regulations, oversight and enforcement mechanism.

As a result, 13 countries saw a drop in their scores from the 32 countries in the region. 

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The opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) said the government had both failed to protect Islam and was undermining Islamic traditions and weakening Maldivians’ faith.

The DRP would block the government’s decision to authorise the sale of alcohol in tourist hotels on inhabited islands, said MP Ahmed Thasmeen Ali, DRP deputy leader, at a rally on Artificial Beach last night.

“Our whole social fabric is being weakened because of activities like this,” he said. “This will cause serious harm to our society. These things are serious atrocities attempted by today’s government and we condemn it.”

Thasmeen criticised the Islamic ministry for being ineffectual in their opposition to the regulations.

“The way things are organised in the Maldivian government, there is no role for the institution responsible for Islamic affairs. There’s no way for them to work. There’s no weight to what they say. They are set aside,” he said.

He further said the attorney general’s remarks, that the regulations did not have legal bearing and should not be implemented, revealed a lack of coordination and inconsistency in the government’s policies.

“Does the attorney general only have a role when the people take to the streets?” said Thasmeen.

Last week, the economic development ministry revised regulations on the import and use of alcohol, pork and products to revoke liquor permits and authorise sale of alcohol in tourist hotels on inhabited islands.

But, following pressure from the public, NGOs and the Islamic ministry, it withdrew the regulations and sent them to a parliamentary committee for advice.

At a press conference on Sunday, Economic Development Minister Mohamed Rasheed said he did not believe alcohol should be sold in an Islamic country and the lack of a monitoring mechanism for liquor permits issued by the previous government for expatriates had created a black market for alcohol.

“So we were studying ways to control it. But in controlling it, we have to consider that our economy is based on the tourism sector and how we could control it in a way that does not weaken the tourism industry,” he said.

Rasheed said the regulation was drafted following consultations with police and customs and was intended to control the illegal sale of alcohol.

“Yellow talk”

Thasmeen went on to say the ministry had not consulted the public before revising the regulation and were now trying to justify its decision by saying it was intended to tackle the illegal sale of alcohol. “This is all yellow talk,” he said.

He added the DRP was concerned because alcohol would be sold across the country.

“The biggest challenge facing us today, the biggest danger, the biggest threat is the effort to weaken our Islamic faith,” he said. “The danger of the effort to destroy, dismantle and weaken our Islamic character.”

The rally was attended by a large number of party supporters, with some bearing placards that attacked the government’s record on religious matters.

Among the speakers, MP Dr Afrashim Ali, a religious scholar, said the decision to authorise sale of alcohol was evidence of the government’s attitude towards Islam.

Afrashim said he believed the government would not win even 12 per cent if a vote was taken today.  

No loopholes

At Sunday’s press conference, Adhil Saleem, state minister of economic development, said the revised regulations were complete and did not have any loopholes. Hotels with over 100 beds would be allowed to have a bar that would only serve foreigners.

Further, it will be illegal to keep alcohol in mini-bars at the hotels on inhabited islands or sell it anywhere apart from the hotel’s main bar.

Maldivians cannot be employed at the bar and all employees of the bar must be registered with the economic development ministry after a police clearance; the bar must further not be easily accessible to people who enter the hotel or visible from outside.

An inventory of the alcohol in storage and daily sales must be maintained and made available to police on their request, while CCTV cameras must be mounted at the storage room at hotel.

Rasheed said police told the ministry the new regulations would make it easier for police to target the illegal sale of alcohol in Male’.

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