Author: JJ Robinson

Commonwealth to provide technical assistance to help resolve Maldives’ judicial crisis

The Commonwealth will provide technical expertise to the Maldives to help resolve the ongoing judicial crisis in the Maldives, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has stated.

High Commissioner of the Maldives to the UK, Dr Farahanaz Faizal, met with Deputy Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Mmasekgoa Masire-Mwamba this week and raised “the urgent need to modernise the Judiciary to international standards and possible Commonwealth assistance in this regard.”

The crisis was sparked on January 16 when the government ordered the military to detain Chief Judge of the Criminal Court, Abdulla Mohamed, after he filed a High Court injunction against his police summons.

Allegations against the judge dating back to 2005 include misogyny, sexual deviancy, throwing out an assault case despite the confession of the accused, political bias, obstruction of police duty, disregarding decisions of high courts, deliberately holding up cases involving opposition figures, barring media from corruption trials, ordering the release of suspects detained for serious crimes without a single hearing, maintaining “suspicious ties” with family members of convicts sentenced for dangerous crimes, and releasing a murder suspect “in the name of holding ministers accountable” who went on to kill another victim.

In one instance Abdulla Mohamed was accused of requesting that two underage victims of sexual assault act out their attack in court, in front of the perpetrator.

The judge had previously been under investigation by the Judicial Services Commission (JSC), but had successfully sought an injunction from the Civil Court against his further investigation by the judicial watchdog.

The JSC itself has itself been accused of perjury, embezzlement and corruption – by one of its own members.

The ongoing detention of the judge has polarised public opinion in the Maldives and resulted in several weeks of opposition-led protests consisting of between 200-400 people, some of them resulting in violence and injuries to police, protesters and journalists.

Judge was “clearly demonstrating his independence”: ICJ Australia

Earlier this week ABC Radio in Australia aired an interview with John Dowd, President of the Australian branch of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), who stated that Judge Abdulla Mohamed had “clearly been demonstrating independence as he’s supposed to do and the government doesn’t like it.”

None of the government’s allegations against the judge warranted his arrest, Dowd argued, “and it’s clear that the must be immediately released. This will do serious damage to the Maldives internationally and their tourist industry is a big part of their income and they just can’t allow this to go on.”

The Maldivian judiciary, Dowd claimed, was “generally competent”.

“It’s not a legally focused country. They’ve had a change of government after some 30 odd years and there’s obviously a settling down period and they do need assistance in terms of bringing their legal system up to date. But nonetheless, there is nothing wrong with the way the judges carry out their duties and it’s just a classic situation of a government not liking someone’s decision.

“It’s got a funny legal system in that there are aspects of Sharia law in it and British Commonwealth law and so on. But I would have thought that the Commonwealth Secretariat could have arranged some judges or someone that could go in there to mediate, and the Commonwealth is the more likely basis for resolving the issue. It really is very difficult for outsiders to intervene and I don’t think the UN is the correct body,” Dowd told the ABC.

Maldives Foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem responded to the criticism on ABC Radio the following day.

The government, he said, did not want to keep Abdulla Mohamed under arrest, but did not want him sitting on the bench until the charges against him were cleared – “but the point here is that we are in a Catch-22 situation – which court do we go to?

“Existing judges swore themselves in unilaterally without looking into the relevant clauses of the constitution, which says that they have to be sworn in according to the new constitution.

“Now, this new constitution strictly stipulates that these judges should have qualification to act as judges. The present judges that we have don’t have these qualifications.

“There are quite a lot of people whose interests are vested with these judges. That is, there are politicians connected to the former regime, who have many court cases. Now all these court cases are being held by the judge who is under detention at the moment. No cases have been conducted on this and no sentence has been passed. So it’s in the interests of the opposition to see that this judge remains as a judge.”

The country’s “entire judiciary is at stake”, Naseem argued. “What democracy can we have, when we don’t have a proper judicial system and we can’t dispense justice properly? The democracies of the world should really help us and find ways of sorting this issue out. We have requested UN bodies to help us in this and they’ve promised to send us some people to sit down with us and work something through.”

Criminal Court letter

Meanwhile, a group of Criminal Court judges this week sent a letter to Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Ahmed Faiz, contending that the Supreme Court had as much responsibility for the crisis as President Mohamed Nasheed.

Ensuring an independent judiciary as envisioned in the new constitution adopted in August 7, 2008 was “a legal as well as national duty” of the Supreme Court, the judges noted, adding that it was “regrettable” that the Criminal Court’s functions have not been developed in line with the changes to the criminal justice system.

Among the main points raised in the letter included the Supreme Court abolishing an article in the Judicature Act – “without any discussions with anyone” – that stipulated the formation of judicial councils, intended to represent all courts and provide advice and counsel.

The Supreme Court also took over a case filed at the Civil Court challenging the legality and validity of the JSC’s process for vetting candidates to the High Court “in the name of public interest litigation” and dismissed the case without issuing a verdict.

Moreover, the letter stated, the Chief Justice “turned a deaf ear” to numerous complaints from the public as well as judges and took no action regarding Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed.

The judges also criticised the Supreme Court for not undertaking efforts towards dialogue with the government or President Nasheed to resolve the current crisis, calling on the Chief Justice to bring both sides to the negotiating table.

The letter took note of inconsistent standards and rulings made by different judges of the Criminal Court regarding extension of detention and evaluating evidence as well as the release of suspects detained for serious crimes, and referred to a list of “urgently needed” reforms previously recommended to the Supreme Court.

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“Maldives lied”: New7wonders controversy continues in South Korea

A documentary regarding New7Wonders, aired on South Korean national broadcaster KBS, has drawn on the Maldives’ experience with the foundation and ignited controversy in the country regarding the nature of the competition.

Korea’s Jeju island was announced as one of the winners in the competition, along with the Amazon rainforest, Vietnam’s Halong Bay, Argentina’s Iguazu Falls, Indonesia’s Komodo, the Philippines’ Puerto Princesa underground river, and South Africa’s Table Mountain.

Votes were collected online and via paid SMS and phone voting in the various countries, in collaboration with telecom sponsors. Final vote counts for the winners were not revealed, however New7Wonders maintains that the process is “uniquely democratic”.

Following the airing of the program in South Korea, founder of the Swiss-based New7Wonders operation and self-described filmmaker, museum curator, aviator and explorer, Bernard Weber, visited the country to denounce it.

“Only a few reporters were able to attend the conference due to the short notice,” noted the Korea Herald.

“Since the announcement [about Jeju] was made, however, media outlets and activists here have been raising suspicions concerning the foundation’s identity, the money Jeju spent to be chosen and whether it was fair for government officials to take part in the voting multiple times,” the paper reported.

During the press conference, President of the Jeju Tourism Organisation Yang Young-keun revealed that Jeju residents and tourism officials spent 20 billion won (US$18 million) on international phone voting for the competition.

“With the tourism industry accounting for more than 80 percent of Jeju’s economy, 20 billion won does not seem like an unreasonably large amount of money,” Yang added.

Park Dae-seok, an official at Korea’s National Committee for Jeju New7Wonders of Nature, was also quoted as stating that “with Jeju’s 500,000 people, it would have been impossible to have the island named the New Seven Wonders and it is only fair to allow multiple voting in this sense.”

The Maldives’ cabinet announced it was withdrawing from the competition in May 2011, after claiming to have received unexpected demands for cash not explicitly specified in the original contract, in order to continue to “compete meaningfully” in the competition.

Indonesia followed suit, with the country’s tourism authorities announcing the withdrawal of Komodo from the running. In both instances, New7wonders insisted that the Maldives and Komodo remained in the competition while seeking new promoters in both countries.

Demands included ‘sponsorship fees’ (‘platinum’ at US$350,000, or two ‘gold’ at US$210,000 each) and the funding of a ‘World Tour’ event whereby the Maldives would pay for a delegation of people to visit the country, provide hot air balloon rides, press trips, flights, accommodation and communications.

In a comment piece published on Minivan News, New7wonders spokesman Eamonn Fitzgerald responded that the authority to withdraw a participant from the campaign “is a decision for New7Wonders alone, not for any government agency.”

“With the Maldives still a finalist, the critical choice to be made by the key decision-makers in the Maldives is whether to support the campaign or not,” Fitzgerald said at the time.

“I think that it would be a good idea for all the leaders in the Maldives to be active participants in the campaign for the simple reason that it makes good business sense. After all, this is why so many countries, with their public and private sectors, are enthusiastically involved in this global event.”

Voting controversy

Besides Jeju in South Korea, other winning countries responded energetically to the campaign, notably developing countries with large populations desperate to boost tourism revenue.

Vietnam’s central bank in November 2011 sent an urgent communication to the country’s financial institutions, urging them to force their employees to vote for Vietnam’s Halong Bay in the New7wonders competition.

According to the UK’s Financial Times, staff at one of Vietnam’s state-run bank were set quotas of 600 paid SMS votes each.

“Vietnamese officials, perhaps mindful of the growing importance of tourism to the economy, are going the extra mile to try to secure victory, pulling on the many control levers available to the pervasive Communist party,” the FT reported.

However some Vietnamese tourism officials cited by the FT raised concerns about the country’s expenditure on paid voting to win the competition, suggesting that the money and time “would be better spent cleaning up the worsening pollution in Halong Bay, raising safety standards on tour boats after two fatal sinkings in recent years and improving the overall environment for tourism.”

President of the Philippines, Noynoy Aquino, also urged his population to hit the phones and vote for the Puerto Princesa Underground River.

“In the Philippines we have no less than 80 million cellphone users sending nearly 2 billion text messages every day. All we need is one billion votes, so that is half a day,” Aquino said, during the river’s campaign push – a commitment of US$58 million, at PHP2.50 (US$0.058) a vote.

In the Maldives, the Swiss foundation approached telecom provider Dhiraagu seeking US$1 million in sponsorship to be its telecom partner in the Maldives, a figure that dropped by half when the company complained that the price was too high.

In a recorded interview with Korean journalists, obtained by Minivan News, Bernard Weber defends the sponsorship as “not a requirement, but a proposition.”

New7Wonders Director, Jean-Paul de la Fuente, interjects: “The Maldives people basically lied. They said if they did not bring sponsors we had threatened they would be expelled from the campaign. That’s a lie. There was no conditional sponsorship, and the proof is that five of the seven winners had no sponsors.”

Fuente continued: “The reason the Maldives person lied is because he had a personal financial interest in another business. What he did was show selected documents that clearly said there was no condition. When he resigned an alternative civic group tried to become a new committee, and he threatened them not to become a new committee.

“Unfortunately the Maldives was until recently a dictatorship, and maybe they still have some of the bad habits of a dictatorship. But we are absolutely clear that the Maldives lied,” Fuente said, and identified Managing Director of the Maldives Marketing and PR Corporation (MMPRC), Simon Hawkins, as “the main problem.”

In response, Hawkins told Minivan News today that “the only financial incentive and gain was to save the country over 500,000 US dollars for ridiculous charges from a disreputable organisation, and I succeeded. The Cabinet did their own investigation and reached their own conclusions, which was the same as ours. I also fail to see how Mr Weber can say that we were lying with the concrete evidence against him.”

Following the Maldives’ withdrawal, New7wonders approached the Maldives Association of Tourism and Travel Operators (MATATO) to take over from the MMPRC as the organising committee of the Maldives’ campaign – a move opposed by the MMPRC, as “the democratically elected Government of the Maldives is the only legitimate authority to act in the name of the Maldives and its people”.

Secretary General of MATATO, Maleeh Jamal, said at the time that the association was considering taking over the event in the government’s stead, as the studies offered by New7Wonders promised an “enormous return on investment”, and “US$500,000 for such an award would be quickly recovered. Although the money was a concern, we had a fair chance of winning,” he said at the time.

Asked today whether the MMPRC had threatened MATATO not to continue in the competition, Jamal said he did not wish to comment: “It was a huge controversy and now the whole saga is over,” he said.

Business model

The studies referred to by MATATO were also referenced by Fitzgerald in a letter to Minivan News following the cabinet decision to withdraw:

  1. Study published by Pearson of London in April 2010: US$5 billion overall in economic, tourism and brand image values for the participants and winners in the man-made New 7 Wonders of the World campaign;
  2. Study published by Grant Thornton of South Africa in April 2011: US$1.012 billion each in economic and employment value for the first five years for being successful in the New7Wonders of Nature;
  3. New study published by JDI of South Korea in May 2011: up to US$1.837 billion each per annum in economic benefits for being successful in the New7Wonders of Nature.

The New 7 Wonders of Nature was the second competition of its kind to be held by the foundation. The first, concerning man-made wonders of the world, awarded the title to Chichen Itza in Mexico, Christ the Redeemer in Brazil, Colosseum in Rome, Great Wall in China, Machu Picchu in Peru, Petra in Jordan, and the Taj Mahal in India. The Pyramids of Giza in Egypt – one of the original 7 wonders, was eventually awarded an honorary title after the Ministry of Tourism complained.

Following Indonesia’s decision to withdraw Komodo, Indonesian blogger Priyadi Nurcahyo Faith collected 15 years of tourism statistics for three of the winning attractions in the first competition, as well as national tourism arrivals, and graphed them in an attempt to correlate the effect of winning the competition.

Visitor numbers to 2007 New 7 Wonders winners. Source: Priyardi's Place

Machu Picchu recorded high growth in (overseas) visitors between 1998 and 2000 of over 20 percent a year. Visitor numbers slumped over 16 percent in 2001, returning to 40 percent in 2005. By 2006, visitors had plunged to 1.14 percent. In 2007 – the year Machu Picchu was announced a winner of the New 7 wonders competition, it had risen to 14 percent, slowing to 12 percent in 2008. In 2009 growth plunged 5 percent, worsening to 18 percent in 2010. Overall arrivals to Peru increased 41 percent in 2004, and 14 percent in the year of the competition. Arrivals dropped 4 percent in 2009.

The Taj Mahal in India showed a broadly similar trend. Foreign visitors increased dramatically 62 percent in 2005, before plunging 17 percent the following year. In 2007, visitor numbers grew 19 percent, but in 2008 the increase was less that 1 percent. Visitors dropped almost 17 percent in 2009. The increase in tourism arrivals to India as a whole continued a downward trend from 13 percent in 2005 to 7 percent in 2008.

Petra, which recorded both foreign and domestic visitors, saw a significant spike in 2007 of over 60 percent, building on a broadly positive trend from a dramatic increase of 93 percent in 2004. Visitors increased 38 percent in 2008, dropped nine percent in 2009, and increased 34 percent in 2010.

At the same time, overall visitors to Jordan dropped 3 percent in 2007, despite almost 19 percent growth the year before.

The blogger’s conclusion was that the New 7 Wonders contribution to visitor numbers was difficult to correlate amid other factors – but was likely “not so significant”.

The controversy surrounding Indonesia and the Maldives’ withdrawal from the competition, and most recently the growing attention in South Korea, has sparked interest in the foundation’s business model.

A ‘New7Wonders Foundation’ is registered in the Swiss canton of Zurich as a charitable foundation, however the New7Wonders own website describes it as “a major, global-scale proof of a business concept based on mass virtual online dynamics creating concrete economic positive outcomes in the real world”.

The Maldives Tourism Ministry initially paid a US$199 participation fee and signed a contract not with the foundation, but rather a commercial arm of the operation: New Open World Corporation (NOWC), which listed its address on the contract as a law firm in the Republic of Panama.

The fate of the money paid to NOWC by tourism authorities, sponsors and telecom partners in unclear. Funds raised, the website states, are used “to set up and run the global New7Wonders voting platform, to run the first campaign that chose the Official New 7 Wonders of the World, to run the current campaign electing the Official New7Wonders of Nature, to run the New7Wonders organisation, [and] to create a surplus for distribution.”

Swiss law does not require charitable foundations to disclose how much they pay executives, unlike the UK, and no filings, declarations of assets or record of funds distributed are available on the foundation’s website.

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Nasheed vows “independent and fair judiciary” before end of first term, in leaked audio

An audio clip of President Mohamed Nasheed vowing to ensure a fair judiciary before the 2013 presidential election has been leaked to local media.

The audio was reportedly one of several recorded during a meeting with the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF).

“Freedom of expression and an independent and fair judiciary in this country – I will not go for the election after these five years without doing these two things,” Nasheed is heard to say.

He added that according to Home Minister Hassan Afeef, “the entire criminal justice system of this country is being destroyed because of a single judge.”

Chief Judge of the Criminal Court Abdulla Mohamed, who was detained on January 16 by the MNDF after he sought a High Court injunction to prevent a police summons, “will not retain his place on the bench under this government even if he is released [from Girifushi].”

“I will tell the army very clearly that [Abdulla Mohamed] will not get closer than 100 meters to the courthouse,” Nasheed said.

In another leaked clip, Nasheed argues that judges were not appointed lawfully and their verdicts and judgments were therefore suspect.

Several local media outlets reported Nasheed’s comments as a threat from the President not to hold elections unless the judiciary was reformed.

President Nasheed’s Press Secretary Mohamed Zuhair was not responding to calls at time of press.

“The opposition is twisting what the President said,” responded a source in the President’s Office. “He was promising to reform the judiciary before the conclusion of his first term in office – he has no intention of calling off any elections.”

The Maldives is currently in the throes of a judicial crisis, after Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed scuttled an investigation by the judicial watchdog into his alleged misconduct by applying for a Civil Court injunction to halt the process. The Judicial Services Commission (JSC) yesterday argued in parliament that it had no option but to obey the ruling of a body it was tasked with overseeing.

That investigation concerned politically bias comments made on DhiTV, which an unreleased JSC report states violated the judge’s Code of Conduct.

The government has presented a bevy of allegations against the judge, listing 14 cases of obstruction of police duty including withholding warrants for up to four days, ordering police to conduct unlawful investigations and disregarding decisions by higher courts, “deliberately” holding up cases involving opposition figures, barring media from corruption trials, ordering the release of suspects detained for serious crimes “without a single hearing”, and maintaining “suspicious ties” with family members of convicts sentenced for dangerous crimes.

The judge also released a murder suspect “in the name of holding ministers accountable”, who went on to kill another victim.

Earlier allegations, forwarded to former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom in 2005 by then Attorney General Dr Hassan Saeed, included allegations of misogyny, sexual deviancy, and throwing out an assault case despite the confession of the accused.

In one instance, Dr Saeed told Gayoom, the Chief Judge made two underage victims of sexual assault act out the assault “in the presence of the perpetrator and the rest of the court.”

The judge remains in detention and the government is appealing to the international community for independent and authoritative legal assistance to resolve the impasse and reform the judiciary. Meanwhile, opposition supporters have held two weeks of nightly protests calling for the judge’s release.

No organisation has yet stepped forward, however a UN spokesperson from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights over the weekend encouraged the government to “release the judge from custody or charge him with a crime.”

The matter has also been raised in the UK Parliament’s House of Commons by Conservative Party MP for Salisbury, John Glen.

“Although the judiciary is constitutionally independent, sitting judges are underqualified, often corrupt and hostile to the democratically elected regime,” Glen stated.

Leader of the House of Commons, George Young, responded that Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, Alistair Burt, was “in touch with the Maldives President to see whether we can resolve the impasse. The high commission in Colombo is also engaged. We want to help the Maldives to make progress towards democratic reform in the direction that John Glen outlines.”

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Resolving judicial crisis “a huge challenge” for the Maldives: President Nasheed

Judges in the Maldives were reappointed by the Judicial Services Commission (JSC) at the conclusion of the interim period “in conflict with the constitution”, President Mohamed Nasheed has said during his weekly radio address.

The JSC reappointed the vast majority of sitting judges prior to parliament approving a statute establishing the criteria for serving on the bench, Nasheed said.

The consequence – a judiciary almost identical as the one appointed by the former Ministry of Justice under the previous government, but badged as independent – was “a huge challenge” for the Maldives, he added.

Prior to the reappointments, the President’s Office in May 2010 sent a letter to the JSC expressing concern that a large number of judges lacked both the educational qualifications and ethical conduct required of judges in a democracy.

“While the Act relating to Judges was passed in August 2010, and while the Constitution is very clear that Judges cannot be appointed without this Act, to date the JSC has failed to reappoint Judges,” Nasheed said.

“The Supreme Court Judges were appointed in accordance with the Constitution and law. The High Court bench was appointed in accordance with the Constitution and law. However, it is hard to say that the lower court Judges were appointed as per the Constitution and law,” he contended.

The government has faced critcism from the opposition and weeks of opposition-led protests, some of them violent, after the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) took Chief Judge of the Criminal Court, Abdulla Mohamed, into custody on January 16.

The government had accused the chief judge of endemic corruption, obstructing police investigations and of links with both the opposition and organised crime. Abdulla Mohamed sought a High Court ruling to prevent his arrest – which was granted – leading police to request the MNDF to take the judge into custody.

The judge was previously under investigation by the JSC – the judicial watchdog body – however he was granted an injunction by the Civil Court which ordere the JSC to halt the investigation.

In his radio address, Nasheed identified four areas of reform under the 2008 constitution: change of regime through multiparty elections, election of a new parliament, introduction of decentralised administration, and election of local councils.

“The major remaining reform envisioned by the Constitution is the establishment of an independent and competent judiciary,” Nasheed said.

The Foreign Ministry has requested a senior international legal delegation from the United Nations Human Rights Commission (OHCHR) to help resolve the current judicial crisis.

Last week, former President’s member on the JSC, Aishath Velezinee, told Minivan News that outside help from an independent and authoritative body such as the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) was desperately needed.

“We need the ICJ to be involved – someone like [former] UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers, Leandro Despouy. He was here for a fact-finding mission and had a thorough understanding of it, and gives authoritative advice,” she said.

“We need to look for people who understand not only the law in the constitution, but what we are transiting from. Because that is really important. The UN had brought in a former Australian Supreme Court Judge, but he didn’t get any support. There was a lady [from Harvard] but she left in tears as well. There was no support – the JSC voted not to even give her a living allowance. They are unwelcoming to knowledge – to everyone. It is a closed place,” she warned, adding the difficulty was enhanced further because all the documentation was in Dhivehi.

UK MP for Salisbury, John Glen, has meanwhile urged UK Parliament to “urgently make time for a debate on judicial reform in the Republic of the Maldives.”

“Although the judiciary is constitutionally independent, sitting judges are underqualified, often corrupt and hostile to the democratically elected regime,” Glen stated.

Leader of the House of Commons, George Young, responded that Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, Alistair Burt, was “in touch with the Maldives President to see whether we can resolve the impasse. The high commission in Colombo is also engaged. We want to help the Maldives to make progress towards democratic reform in the direction that John Glen outlines.”

Several hundred opposition protesters meanwhile gathered last night for the second week running, with police arresting several dozen people and deploying pepper spray after the crowd reportedly began hurling paving stones at officers outside the Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) building.

MP Ahmed Nihan of former President Gayoom’s Progressive Party of the Maldives (PPM) and recently-resigned SAARC Secretary General Dhiyana Saeed were among those detained by police. Haveeru reported that 17 of the 22 arrested were detained in Dhoonidhoo custodial overnight.

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Allegations against Chief Judge first sent to Gayoom in 2005

The first complaints filed against Chief Judge of the Criminal Court Abdulla Mohamed in July 2005 included allegations of misogyny, sexual deviancy, and throwing out an assault case despite the confession of the accused, Minivan News has learned.

A letter sent to President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom by then Attorney General Hassan Saeed, obtained by Minivan News (page 1, 2), outlined three specific allegations against Abdulla Mohamed.

While presiding over a sexual offence case against Azeem Abdullah of Chaandhaneege, G.A.Kanduhulhudhoo, on May 19, 2005, Saeed told Gayoom that Abdulla Mohamed “made the two children who were summoned as witnesses against the accused stand in front [of the court] and asked them to look at the people present.

“He then made the children identify the individuals they were looking at. Although the children said in court that the accused performed the indecent act he was accused of, the Judge made the children act out the indecent act in the presence of the perpetrator and the rest of the court.”

Saeed’s second allegation concerned the hearing of physical assault case on June 6, 2005, against Ibrahim Ali of H. Saaroakaage.

“The case was submitted based on the admission of the accused that he had committed the assault, but Judge Abdulla Mohamed of the Criminal Court dismissed the case, stating that there was no case against the accused,” Saeed wrote.

In Saeed’s third allegation, concerning a criminal case on June 6, 2005, against Ahmed Naeem of Male’ Municipality Special Register, “after completing the sentencing of the defendant, Abdulla Mohamed said, ‘…very few men ever meet women who love them. You may meet a woman who loves and cares for you. You should not run after a woman who does not love you. It is also stated in Holy Quran that women are very deceptive.’”

The Judicial Services Commission (JSC), the judicial watchdog, eventually formed a complaints committee to investigate the cases against Judge Abdulla in December 2009, which met 44 times but had failed to present a single report as of March 2011.

Speaking at an opposition rally on January 24 against the detention of Abdulla Mohamed, Saeed acknowledged that he was “not satisfied with Judge Abdulla’s actions either.”

“[But] he did not have to do things to my satisfaction. I submitted the legal points I noticed [related to the judge’s conduct] to the head of the judiciary at the time, President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom. I could have removed Judge Abdulla from the post through pressure. But I did not do it because it was not my responsibility,” Dr Saeed said.

“The constitution today forbids influencing judges. So, looking at the current scenario, the country has gone ten years backward.”

The current judicial crisis was sparked after Abdulla Mohamed filed a case in the Civil Court which granted him an injunction halting his further investigation by the JSC. This was following by a High Court ruling against a police summons on January 16, which prompted police to request the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) take the judge into custody.

Home Minister Hassan Afeef subsequently accused the judge of “taking the entire criminal justice system in his fist”, listing 14 cases of obstruction of police duty including withholding warrants for up to four days, ordering police to conduct unlawful investigations and disregarding decisions by higher courts.

Afeef accused the judge of “deliberately” holding up cases involving opposition figures, barring media from corruption trials, ordering the release of suspects detained for serious crimes “without a single hearing”, and maintaining “suspicious ties” with family members of convicts sentenced for dangerous crimes.

The judge also released a murder suspect “in the name of holding ministers accountable”, who went on to kill another victim.

Vice President of the Maldives Dr Mohamed Waheed Hassan opposed the judge’s detention, stating on his blog that “I am ashamed and totally devastated by the fact that this is happening in a government in which I am the elected Vice President.”

The government then requested assistance from the international community to reform the judiciary. Observing that judicial reform “really should come from the Judicial Services Commission (JSC)”, Foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem said the commission’s shortcoming are “now an issue of national security.”

“We have been working to improve the judiciary since we came to power, but we have not succeeded,” said Naseem. “We have asked the international community to assist us in this effort several times, and we find that they are willing to help at this point,” he explained.

A group of lawyers have meanwhile sent a case to the International Criminal Court (ICC), appealing that the judge’s detention is an “enforced disappearance” under the ICC’s Rome Statute.

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Religious intolerance sees Maldives drop to 73rd in Press Freedom Index

The Maldives has fallen 21 places on Reporters Without Borders (RSF)’s press freedom index between 2010 and 2011.

The country is now ranked 73, level with the Seychelles and below Sierra Leone but still well above many countries in both the region and the Middle East countries, including Qatar, Oman and the UAE.

The Maldives took a giant leap in 2009 to 51 following the introduction of multiparty democracy – in 2008 it had been ranked 104.

RSF has however recently expressed concern at the rising climate of religious intolerance in the Maldives and its impact on freedom of expression.

“A climate of religious intolerance prevailed in the Maldives, where media organisations were subjected to threats by the authorities and had to deal with an Islamic Affairs Ministry bent on imposing Sharia to the detriment of free expression,” RSF stated.

In November 2011 the organisation reacted to the Islamic Ministry’s order to block the website of controversial blogger Ismail ‘Hilath’ Rasheed, stating that “the increase in acts of religious intolerance is a threat to the Maldives’ young democracy”.

“Incidents involving media workers are rare but that is only because most of them prefer to censor themselves and stay away from subjects relating to Islam. The government should not give in to the fanatical minority but must do all it can to ensure the media are free to tackle any subjects they choose,” the organisation said.

Rasheed was subsequently arrested on the evening of December 14 for his involvement in a “silent protest” calling for religious tolerance, held on Human Rights Day. The protesters had been attacked and Rasheed hospitalised after being struck with a stone.

On his release without charge three weeks later, Rasheed expressed concern for his safety.

“The majority of Maldivians are not violent people. But I am concerned about a few psychotic elements who believe they will go to heaven if they kill me – people who don’t care if they go to jail for it. Those people I am afraid of, and I will not provoke the country in the future,” he told Minivan News.

In September 2011 the government published new ‘religious unity’ regulations enforcing parliament’s religious unity act of 1994, with a penalty of 2-5 years imprisonment for violation.

Under the regulations, the media is banned from producing or publicising programs, talking about or disseminating audio deemed to “humiliate Allah or his prophets or the holy Quran or the Sunnah of the Prophet (Mohamed) or the Islamic faith.”

More recently several journalists with the Maldives National Broadcasting Corporation (MNBC) were beaten, threatened and tasered after protesters from the opposition and ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) clashed outside the station. Both sides blamed each other for the attacks, while MNBC said it would no longer cover the ongoing protests on scene.

The government meanwhile claimed that its commitment to media freedom is “absolute and unwavering.”

“President Nasheed’s administration never has and never will do anything to undermine the independence, integrity or professionalism of the media,” said President Mohamed Nasheed’s Press Secretary, Mohamed Zuhair.

Zuhair’s comments followed allegations that Communications Minister Adhil Saleem had intimidated journalists by threatening to withdraw broadcasting licenses, which Zuhair claimed was “merely” a reaction to “certain TV news channels acting unprofessionally when airing footage of recent protests.”

Despite the fall, the Maldives was still ranked significantly higher than many other countries in the region.

Sri Lanka fell to 163, continuing a steady decline over the last decade (it was ranked 51 in 2002).

“The stranglehold of the Rajapakse clan [has] forced the last few opposition journalists to flee the country,” RSF said in a statement on the release of the 2011 Index.

“Any that stayed behind were regularly subjected to harassment and threats. Attacks were less common but impunity and official censorship of independent news sites put an end to pluralism and contributed more than ever to self-censorship by almost all media outlets.”

Bangladesh fared poorly (129) – “despite genuine media pluralism, the law allows the government to maintain excessive control over the media and the Internet” – while Nepal (109) showed modest improvement with a drop off in violence between the government and Maoist rebels.

India’s position fell (131) after the government unveiled the “Information Technology Rules 2011, which have dangerous implications for online freedom of expression. Foreign reporters saw their visa requests turned down or were pressured to provide positive coverage.”

Pakistan (151st) meanwhile remained the world’s deadliest country for journalists for the second year running.

Finland, Norway, Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland were ranked as having the greatest press freedom, while North Korea and Eritrea fared the worst.

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Foreign Minister to file defamation case over DQP’s claims he voted to form State of Israel

Foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem has announced he will file a defamation case against the Dhivehi Qaumee Party (DQP), after it published a pamphlet alleging among other claims that he had secretly voted for the formation of the state of Israel.

“I was not even born then,” Naseem said today. “But the Maldivian public do not know this – many of them don’t know when the state of Israel was created.”

Naseem said people were now shouting at him in the street calling him a “Jew-lover” and making threatening telephone calls following publication of the pamphlet.

The Maldives co-sponsored a resolution to grant Palestine full membership to UNESCO, but the delegation returned before voting.

The resolution was adopted with 107 countries voting in favour, 14 voting against and 52 abstaining, signaling a significant symbolic victory for Palestine’s bid for statehood ahead of a similar vote at the UN General Assembly in New York.

However in the chapter of the contentious pamphlet headed “Helping the Jews instead of aiding the poor people of Palestine”, the DQP states that: “Nasheed’s current Foreign Minister ‘Kerafa’ Naseem is a person who voted on behalf of the Maldives at the UN to [recognise] Israel as an independent nation. Naseem’s action was contrary to both the order and view of the government at the time.”

The party further accused the government of efforts to “familiarise Maldivians with Jews and Israel, and show their virtue and induce love and empathy in Maldivian hearts. Nasheed’s government has brought in teams under different names such as doctors and agriculturists and begun the actual work of acquainting Maldivians with Jews.”

Police interrogated and briefly detained leaders of the DQP on January 12, after the President’s Office requested an investigation into “slanderous” statements alleging the government was working under the influence of “Jews” and “Christian priests” to weaken Islam in the Maldives and incite religious hatred.

DQP council members including former Justice Minister Dr Mohamed Jameel Ahmed and ‘Sandhaanu’ Ahmed Ibrahim Didi were summoned for questioning, while party leader and former Attorney General, Dr Hassan Saeed, accompanied the pair as their lead lawyer.

The Criminal Court’s decision not to extend the detention of the pair eventually led the government to accuse Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed of corruption and political favouritism, and in the absence of activity from the judicial watchdog, order his detention on Girifushi until the judicial crisis was resolved. The move has sparked more than a week of opposition-led protests.

Naseem said today that the international community had not expressed concern about the contents of the DQP pamphlet – “I think they see it as totally ridiculous. No one has spoken to us about it, and I don’t think it’s relevant,” he said.

“The DQP doesn’t have even 2000 members in its party. The leaders are the same people who passed sentences against people with no trial or legal representation [under the former government],” Naseem alleged. With the detention of the chief judge, “Now, suddenly, they have discovered democracy.”

ICC

A group of lawyers have meanwhile forwarded the chief judge’s case to the International Ciminal Court, contesting the conditions of the judge’s arrest and his detention at Girifushi.

One of the lawyers, Maumoon Hameed, said the case was submitted “as the continued detention of Judge Mohamed is in clear violation of the International Convention on the Protection of all Persons against Enforced Disappearance.”

Naseem responded by welcoming the submission of a case alleging human rights violation to the ICC: “Our aim is for all Maldivians to have access to the highest court in the international criminal legal system so as to achieve remedy and redress for grave crimes against humanity,” Naseem said, although he said he suspected the lawyers had misconstrued the definition of “crimes against humanity” as defined in the Rome Statute.”

“It’s a good sign in a democracy when locals use the international legal system. This is a proud moment for the government,” Naseem said.

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Q&A: Silent coup has cost Maldives a judiciary, says Aishath Velezinee

Aishath Velezinee was formerly the President’s Member on the Judicial Services Commission (JSC), the watchdog body assigned to appoint and investigate complaints against judges.

She has consistently maintained that the JSC is complicit in protecting judges appointed under the former government, colluding with parliament to ensure legal impunity for senior opposition supporters. During her tenure at the JSC she was never given a desk or so much as a chair to sit down on. In January 2011 she was stabbed twice in the back in broad daylight.

The JSC is now at the centre of a judicial crisis that has led to the military’s detention of Chief Judge of the Criminal Court, Abdulla Mohamed.

JJ Robinson: To what extent does the current judicial crisis represent the failure of Article 285 in 2010, the constitutional provision guaranteeing an independent and qualified judiciary at the conclusion of the two year interim period?

Aishath Velezinee: 100 percent. This was what I was trying to bring out at the time – but I could only allege that Abdulla Mohamed was at the heart of the matter. But it was very obvious to me that this was not just the action of one man, but a hijacking of the judiciary [by the opposition] – the ‘silent coup’.

In the highly politicised environment at time it was very difficult to get people to look into this, because parliament was out to cover it up – nobody was willing to take it up, and everyone wanted distance because it was too sensitive and so highly politicised. So really no one wanted to try and see if there was any truth to what I was saying.

Time passed. I didn’t imagine all this would come up so soon – it has been an amazing experience to see all of this suddenly happening so quickly.

It was inevitable – with everything Abdulla Mohamed has done inside and outside the courts, it was very obvious that he was not a man to be a judge.

With all the highly political rulings coming from the Criminal Court, it was clearly not right. The JSC’s cover up of Abdulla Mohamed was also apparent.

He had spoken on TV [against the government] – and it was not just his voice. There was no need to spend two years investigating whether he had said what he said.

Finally they decided yes, he is highly politicised, and had lost the capacity to judge independently and impartially. His views and verdicts were expressing not just partiality towards the opposition, but apparently a very deep anger against the government. It is very obvious when you speak to him or see him on the media. We had to look at what was behind all this.

JJ: Abdulla Mohamed filed a case in the Civil Court which ordered the JSC investigation be halted. Does the JSC have any jurisdiction to rule against its own watchdog body?

AV: Absolutely not. If the judicial watchdog can be overruled by a judge sitting in some court somewhere, then it’s dysfunctional. But that’s what has been happening. And [Supreme Court Judge] Adam Mohamed, Chair of the JSC, has probably been encouraging Abdulla Mohamed to do this.

The whole approach of the JSC is to cover up the judge’s misconduct. When it comes to Abdulla Mohamed it’s not just issues of misconduct – it’s possible links with serious criminal activities. There is every reason to believe he is influenced by serious criminals in this country.

JJ: The international community has expressed concern over the government’s ongoing detention of the judge by the military. Is the government acting within the constitution?

AV: It is impossible to work within the constitution when you have lost one arm of the state: we are talking about the country not having a judiciary. When one man becomes a threat to national security – and the personal security of everyone – the head of state must act.

He can’t stand and watch while this man is releasing people accused of murder, who then go out and kill again the same day. We are seeing these reports in the media all along, and everyone is helpless.

If the JSC was functioning properly – and if the Majlis was up to its oversight duties – we would not have got to this stage. But when all state institutions fail, then it is necessary to act rather than watch while the country falls down.

JJ: What next? The government surely can’t keep the judge detained indefinitely.

AV: We have to find a solution. It is not right to keep someone detained without any action – there must be an investigation and something must happen. I’m sure the government is looking into Abdulla Mohamed.

But releasing him is a threat to security. I have heard Vice President Mohamed Waheed Hassan calling for him to be released. Abdulla Mohamed is not under arrest – but his freedom of movement and communication would be a danger at this moment. We are at the point where we really and truly need to get to the bottom of this and act upon the constitution.

We talking about cleaning up the judiciary, and this is not talking outside the constitution – this is the foundation of the constitution. The constitution is build upon having three separate powers.

The judiciary is perhaps the most important power. The other powers come and go, politics change, but the judiciary is the balancing act. When that is out of balance, action is necessary.

With regards to attention from the international community – I tried really hard in 2010 to get the international community involved, to come and carry out a public inquiry, because we do not have any institution or eminent person with the authority to look into the matter. We needed outside help.

The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) did come and their report highlighted some things, but they did not have access to all the material because it’s all in Dhivehi. We need a proper inquiry into this, and a solution.

JJ: The Foreign Minister has asked the UN Office of Human Rights to send a legal team able to look into the situation and advise. To what extent will this draw on the constitution’s provision to appoint foreign judges?

AV: That has been something we were interested in doing, but the former interim Supreme Court Judge Abdulla Saeed was absolutely against it – not only bringing in foreign judges, but even judicial expertise. He was also against putting experts in the JSC so it could be properly institutionalised. The ICJ tried very hard to place a judge in there but didn’t get a positive response.

The UN brought in a former Australian Supreme Court Judge, but he didn’t get any support either. There was a lady [from Harvard] but she left in tears as well. There was no support – the Commission voted not to even give her a living allowance. They are unwelcoming to knowledge – to everyone. It is a closed place.

JJ: Is there a risk the UN will send a token advisor and things will quickly return to business as usual?

AV: We need the ICJ to be involved – someone like [former] UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers, Leandro Despouy. He was here for a fact-finding mission and had a thorough understanding of it, and gives authoritative advice.

We need to look for people who understand not only the law in the constitution, but what we are transiting from. Because that is really important.

JJ: There was talk of foreign judges and the establishment of a mercantile court for cases involving more than Rf 100,000 (US$6500). Based on the current state of the judiciary are people now more open to idea of foreign judges, where once they may have opposed it on nationalistic grounds?

AV: It is not a new thing. We have always used foreign knowledge since the time of the Sultans. We used Arabs who came here as our judges, they were respected people. Ibn Battuta practiced here as a judge during his voyages.

So it is not a new concept. This is the way we are – we do not have the knowledge. Now we are transitioning to a modern, independent judiciary, so of course we need new knowledge, practices and skills. The only way to get our judges up to standard is [for foreign judges] to be working in there, hands on.

Of course before that we have to make sure that the people on the bench are people who qualify under the constitution. With the bench we have right now it wouldn’t do much good bringing in expertise, because many of the people sitting there do not even have the basics to understand or move forward, they are limited in not having even basic education.

JJ: What percentage of the judiciary has more than primary school education?

AV: As a foundation, at least 50 percent have less that Grade 7. But they all say they have a certificate in justice studies – a tailor-made program written by the most prominent protester at the moment, former Justice Minister Mohamed Jameel of the Dhivehi Qaumee Party (DQP). There were no textbooks on the course – they were given handouts.

Now we do have access to resources through the internet. But do the judges and magistrates have the skills or language abilities necessary to research on the internet? No they don’t.

JJ: Based on your access to privileged JSC information, you have also previously expressed concern at the high number of judges with actual criminal records. What about Abdulla Mohamed?

AV: Abdulla Mohamed was already a criminal convict before he was appointed to the bench. This man was found guilty of creating public disorder, hate speech and had publicly shown himself to be a woman hater or fearer- I don’t know which. But he has this bias against women and has been quoted as such in the courtroom. He’s got issues.

There are unchecked complaints against him in the JSC. The JSC has this practice of taking every complaint and giving it to committee one at a time. But if you look at everything, there is a pattern suggesting links to criminals. The Criminal Court has been given power as the only court able to rule on police custody during police investigations – why does Abdulla Mohamed have a monopoly on this? He personally locks up the seal. Why does he control it?

JJ: What do you mean when you claim he has links to organised crime?

AV: It’s a pattern. He tries to prevent investigation of all the heavy drug cases, and when the case does make it before the court his decisions are questionable. In one instance newspaper Haveeru sent a complaint saying the Criminal Court had tried a case and changed the verdict behind closed doors.

Haveeru later called for the complaint to be withdrawn. But my approach is to say, once we have a complaint we must check it. The complainant can’t withdraw a complaint, because there must have been a reason to come forward in the first place. That verdict referred to something decided two years before – Abdulla Mohamed changed the name of the convict. A mistake in the name, he said. How can you change a name? A name is an identity. The JSC never investigated it.

JJ: Prior to the JSC’s decision to dissolve the complaints committee, it was receiving hundreds of complaints a year. How many were heard?

AV: Five were tabled, four were investigated. Their approach was that if nobody was talking about the judge, then the judge was above question. So they would cover up and hide all the complaints.

Approach of this constitution is transparency – and the investigation is itself proof of the judge’s independence. An accusation doesn’t mean he is not up to being a judge. But if it is not investigated, those accusations stand. Instead, the JSC says: “We don’t have any complaints, so nobody is under investigation.”

We are struggling between the former approach and the new approach of the constitution. We have seen judges with serious criminal issues kept on bench and their records kept secret. They have a problem adapting themselves to the new constitution and democratic principles that require them to gain trust.

The JSC has many other issues- taking money they are not entitled to, perjury; none of this was looked into. All sorts of things happened in there.

JJ: Is it possible to revive Article 285, or did that expire at the conclusion of the interim period?

AV: Article 285 is the foundation of our judiciary, the institutionalisation of the one power that is going to protect our democracy. How can we measure it against a time period set by us? Two years? We did everything we could to try and enact it. It was a failure of the state that the people did not get the judiciary.

We cannot excuse ourselves by saying that the two years have passed. Parliament elections were delayed – much in the constitution was delayed. 80 percent of the laws required to be passed under this constitution have yet to be adopted. Are we going to say ‘no’ to them because time has passed?

We can’t do that, so we have to act.

JJ: Parliament has oversight of the JSC – what ability does parliament have to reform it?

AV: Parliament has shown itself to be incapable of doing it. We are seeing parliamentarians out trying to free Judge Abdulla Mohamed – including Jumhoree Party (JP) MP Gasim Ibrahim, a member of the JSC.

So I don’t think we even need to enter into this. it is apparent they are playing politics and do not have the interest of the people or the state at heart. They never believed in this constitution, they were pushed into adopting a democratic constitution, they failed in the elections, and now they are out to kill the constitution.

I am wondering even what they are protesting about. Last night it was Judge Abdulla, and the religious card. It is fear driven.

What we are seeing is [former President Maumoon Abdul] Gayoom and [his half brother, Abdulla] Yameen trying to turn their own personal fears into mass hysteria. Nobody else is under threat – but they are if we have an independent judiciary. If their cases are heard they know they are in for life.

JJ: So this is a struggle for survival?

AV: Exactly. The final battle – this is the last pillar of democracy. If we manage to do this properly, as stated in the constitution, we can be a model democracy. But not without a judiciary.

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SAARC Secretary General’s resignation first in regional body’s history

The SAARC Secretariat has said it has yet to formally receive the resignation of Secretary General Dhiyana Saeed, both the youngest individual and first woman to be appointed to the position.

The Secretariat is headquartered in Nepal. In the country’s Himalayan newspaper, Secretariat Spokesperson Niranjan Man Singh Basnyat noted Saeed’s resignation was the first untimely resignation by a Secretary General in SAARC’s 26-year history.

“It will be clear only after the office opens on Monday,” Basnyat told the Nepalese newspaper.

Saeed has confirmed her resignation following her appearance on private broadcaster VTV, owned by opposition-aligned Jumhoree Party (JP) MP Gasim Ibrahim, during which she accused the government of ignoring the law in its detention of Chief Judge of the Criminal Court, Abdulla Mohamed.

If the government contended that Abdulla Mohamed had violated the constitution, “he has to be dealt with within the confines of the law,” Saeed insisted. “The government should not take the law into its own hands.”

Press Secretary for the President Mohamed Zuhair told Minivan News last week that Saeed’s public statements “clearly contravened the SAARC Charter” which “forbids interference in the matters of any state, including the state she represents”.

Resigning before making her public statement against the government would have been the “honourable” approach, Zuhair said. “Now, even should she resign, [her behavior] is still dishonourable and indecent.”

Secretary Generals of the regional body are appointed for three year terms. The Maldives is required to appoint a replacement for Saeed to serve out the rest of her term, which expires on February 28, 2014. The nomination must be endorsed the SAARC Council of Ministers, currently headed by Foreign Minister of the Maldives, Ahmed Naseem.

The ongoing detention of Abdulla Mohamed has caused divisions even among senior members of the government. Vice President Mohamed Waheed Hassan said over the weekend that he was “ ashamed and totally devastated by the fact that this is happening in a government in which I am the elected the Vice President.”

For its part, the government contends that its detention of the Judge is justifiable under the President’s obligation to protect the letter and spirit of the constitution, given the failure of the Judicial Services Commission (JSC) to pursue the many allegations of corruption and political favouritism pending against the judge.

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