Author: Minivan News

Gayoom attends Saudi Crown Prince funeral as President Waheed’s Special Envoy

Former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom attended the state funeral of Saudi Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz on Sunday as the Special Envoy of President Dr Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik.

According to the Foreign Ministry, former President Gayoom attended the funeral at the Masjid al-Haram in the holy city of Mecca and expressed condolences on behalf of the government and people of the Maldives.

“During his stay in Saudi Arabia, His Excellency Maumoon Abdul Gayoom met with His Majesty King of Saudi Arabia Khadim Al-Haramain Al-Sharifain Al-Malek Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud and conveyed to him sincere regards and best wishes from Maldives President His Excellency Dr. Mohamed Waheed,” reads a statement by the Foreign Ministry.

Following the contentious transfer of power on February 7, former President Gayoom’s daughter, Dhunya Maumoon, was appointed State Minister for Foreign Affairs.

Gayoom was visiting Saudi Arabia to address the Constituent Council of the Muslim World League earlier this month, where he called for assistance from Islamic Arab countries in developing education and other services in the Maldives, as well to protect the country’s faith by “groups” he alleged are trying to weaken it.

The former president reportedly claimed that the present economic downturn, a loss of peace and order in the country and efforts “by groups of people to weaken people’s Islamic faith”, were among the most pressing challenges presently facing the Maldives.

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Bangladeshi construction worker dies after fall

A Bangladeshi expatriate construction worker has died after falling six stories in the Maafannu area of the capital Male’, local media has reported.

The fall was reported to have occurred at around 8:15AM this morning. The man was rushed to Indira Ghandi Memorial Hospital (IGMH) before succumbing to his injuries at around 11:45AM.

Police are said to be investigating the circumstances surrounding the accident.

Bangladeshi expatriates make up a significant number of workers in the Maldivian construction industry.

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500 scholarships to be awarded from Zakat fund

Interested candidates have been invited to apply for 500 scholarships to be awarded from the Zakat (alms for the poor) fund to study in local institutions.

State Minister for Education Aminath Ali told local media that the invitation to apply for scholarships from the Rf10 million (US$648,508) fund was announced in the government gazette today.

Under the scheme, Aminath Ali explained, 130 scholarships would be offered for foundation courses, 160 scholarships for degree and diploma courses and 50 scholarships for masters degree courses.

The education ministry would begin accepting application forms from July 1 through 11, she added.

The state minister noted that the ministry would consider educational background as well as financial means of the applicants in shortlisting candidates.

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Media telethon launched for mosque fund

Local television and radio stations along with online newspapers launched a telethon yesterday to raise money for the Islamic Ministry’s mosque fund.

Speaking at a ceremony at the Islamic Centre to inaugurate the fund, Islamic Minister Sheikh Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed said proceeds from the fund would go towards building and renovating mosques in the atolls.

The purpose of the telethon is to raise funds to purchase equipment and begin renovations before the holy fasting month of Ramadan, which begins in July. The telethon is set to continue until next Saturday.

Shaheem added that funds raised so far have been budgeted for the renovation of 17 mosques and proposals have been made to renovate 31 mosques in as many islands.

A family from the capital Male’ donated Rf50,000 (US$3,243) upon request to add a veranda to the island mosque of Alif Alif Mathiveri, Shaheem revealed.

Over Rf2 million (US$129,702) has been donated to the mosque fund to date.

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MIRA omits five businesses from GST non-compliers list

Maldives Inland Revenue Authority (MIRA) has revealed that five businesses or persons have been omitted from the Goods and Services Tax (GST) non-compliers list for the first quarter of 2012.

MIRA explained in a statement yesterday that the list was published in the government gazette on June 14 in accordance with the policy on ‘Disclosure of non-compliant GST registered persons.’

Five businesses or persons from the atolls were omitted from the list after they complained and were discovered to have made the tax payments. They were Blue Link Maldives Pvt Ltd, Ahmed Zuhair, Ahmed Saeed, Ruggiya Ali and Mohamed Saeed.

In its statement, MIRA apologised for “any burden they might have had to bear” as a result of the inclusion in the non-compliers list. The statement noted that non-compliers were contacted through phone or text message before being named in the list, adding that efforts were underway to ensure that non-complier lists disclosed in the future would be accurate.

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Maldives Under-22 squad concedes five in Vietnam training clash

The Maldives Under-22 football team were defeated 5-0 by their Vietnamese counterparts on Sunday during a training match in Thailand.

According to Vietnamese state media, the Maldives squad fell behind 15 minutes into the match and failed to recover after Le Quoc Phuong opened the scoring.

Just three minutes later and the Maldives were 3-0 down after goals from Nguyen Dinh Bao and then Giang Tran Quach Tan allowed Vietnam to see out the first half comfortably in the lead, Viet Nam News reported.

Second half goals by Ngan Van Dai and Mac Hong Quan 48 and 77 minutes into the match respectively sealed a convincing training win for Vietnam.

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Accounting for natural wealth gains world traction: Businessweek

“Putting a price on a natural bounty long taken for granted as free may sound impossible, even ridiculous. But after three decades on the fringes of serious policymaking, the idea is gaining traction, from the vividly clear waters of the Maldives to the sober, suited reaches of the World Bank,” writes Katy Daigle for Businessweek.

“As traditional measures of economic progress like GDP are criticized for ignoring downsides including pollution or diminishment of resources such as fresh water or fossil fuels, there has been an increased urgency to arguments for a more balanced and accurate reckoning of costs.

That is particularly so as fast-developing nations such as India and China jostle with rich nations for access to those resources and insist on their own right to pollute on a path toward growth.

Proponents of so-called “green accounting” — who will gather in Rio de Janeiro this week for the Rio Earth Summit — hope that putting dollar values on resources will slam the brakes on unfettered development. A mentality of growth at any cost is already blamed for disasters like the chronic floods that hit deforested Haiti or the raging sand storms that have swept regions of China, worsening desertification.

Environmental economists argue that redefining nature in stark monetary terms would offer better information for making economic and development decisions.

That, they say, would make governments and corporations less likely to jeopardize future stocks of natural assets or environmental systems that mostly unseen make the planet habitable, from forests filtering water to the frogs keeping swarming insects in check.

If the value of an asset like a machine is reduced as it wears out, proponents say, the same accounting principle should apply to a dwindling natural resource.

‘Environmental arguments come from the heart. But in today’s world based on economics it’s hard for arguments of the heart to win,’ said Pavan Sukhdev, a former banker now leading an ongoing project that was proposed by the Group of Eight industrialized nations to study monetary values for the environment.

That study, started in 2007, has estimated the world economy suffers roughly $2.5 trillion to $4 trillion in losses every year due to environmental degradation. That’s up to 7 percent of global GDP.

‘We need to understand what we’re losing in order to save it,’ Sukhdev said. ‘You cannot manage what you do not measure.’

Using the same accounting principles, some countries are already changing policy.
The Maldives recently banned fishing gray reef sharks after working out that each was worth $3,300 a year in tourism revenue, versus $32 paid per catch. Ugandans spared a Kampala wetland from agricultural development after calculating it would cost $2 million a year to run a sewage treatment facility — the same job the swamp does for free.

But environmental accounting still faces many detractors and obstacles. Among them is resistance from governments who might lack the resources and expertise to publish a “greened” set of national accounts alongside those measuring economic growth.

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IFC delegation addresses government concerns over GMR airport deal

A delegation from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) – a member of the World Bank group and the largest global institution focused on private sector in developing countries – met with senior government officials last week to address concerns over the concession agreement with Indian infrastructure giant GMR to develop the Ibrahim Nasir International Airport (INIA).

Local daily Haveeru reported that the IFC delegation comprised of the country manager to the Maldives, the technical team of the airport development project evaluation committee and its legal team. The delegation reportedly provided information requested by the government regarding the evaluation of the agreement with GMR.

“The government’s main concern is the deduction of the fuel concession fee which includes airport development charge and insurance surcharge by GMR, payable to Maldives Airports Company Limited (MACL). In addition, the government also raises its concern over the restricted opportunities for Maldivians in the development plan of the airport,” the newspaper reported.

According to IFC, the key objectives of the institution in its role as lead advisor to the government in the structuring and awarding of the 25-year concession agreement were:

  • increase the airport’s capacity to handle long-term traffic growth while ensuring that the airport met international technical standards;
  • position the airport as a world-class facility catering to highend tourism;
  • improve operations and service quality standards in line with international best practices;
  • maximize the value of the project for the government in terms of proceeds and quality.
  • implement a successful public-private partnership which could serve as model for other infrastructure projects.

“The concession was awarded to a consortium of GMR Infrastructure Limited (GMR, India) and Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad (MAHB, Malaysia). The consortium will pay $78 million in upfront fees and offered a percentage of shared revenues that represents over $1 billion in fiscal benefits for the government over the length of the concession, calculated on a net present value (NPV) basis. The proposed investment of $400 million represents nearly 40 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP),” reads an IFC document on the airport deal.

“The advisory work was supported by AusAid (Australia), the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, and DevCo. DevCo is a multi-donor program affiliated with the Private Infrastructure Development Group and funded by the UK’s Department for International Development, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, the Swedish International Development Agency, and the Austrian Development Agency.”

On the bidding process, which was organised by the IFC and “evaluated based on the payment of an upfront fee as well as annual concession fees as a percentage of gross revenues to the government”, the document explained that, “Each bidder was required to demonstrate that it had the requisite experience in developing, designing, constructing, operating, and financing airports of a similar size.

“The technical solutions proposed by the bidders were also expected to consider the specific conditions on Hulhulé Island,  including its physical and environmental constraints, and the coordination required between conventional aviation activities, seaplanes, and motor boats.

“The cornerstone of the project was the construction of a new passenger terminal expected to meet LEED silver criteria and to be carbonneutral—i.e., to minimize energy consumption and carbon emissions through the use of energy-efficiency and renewable-energy technologies, and minimize water consumption. The bidders were also asked to make specific, predefined improvements to the existing airport infrastructure, and to manage all core airport services, including the provision of fuel—a historically established role at Malé airport.”

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Two thirds of MDP membership vote in party’s single candidate elections

Two-thirds of the MDP’s 48,181-strong membership base turned out to vote in the party’s single-candidate internal elections, held over the weekend to determine its presidential candidate.

Former President Mohamed Nasheed ran unopposed in the party’s election of its presidential candidate, however the party’s regulations require any candidate to receive at least 10 percent of the party’s vote to secure the nomination.

Following the final count of the 258 ballot boxes, Nasheed recorded 31,798 votes in favour to 269 against his being the party’s presidential candidate.

Chairperson candidate Moosa ‘Reeko’ Manik had 29,044 votes in favour to 2160 against, while Deputy Chairperson candidate Ali Shiyam had 563 in favour to 7 against.

The MDP has maintained calls for early elections following its ousting from power on February 7, with Nasheed resigning during a police and military mutiny under what he subsequently claimed was duress. The party has held regular demonstrations since that time calling for early elections.

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