Author: Minivan News

“Mandela of the Maldives” forced out by police mutiny: Independent

President Mohamed Nasheed was been forced to step down after weeks of opposition protests culminated in a mutiny by police, reports Andrew Buncombe for the UK’s Independent newspaper.

“Supporters of the President said he was the victim of what amounted to a coup.

The former political prisoner who some nicknamed the “Mandela of the Maldives” announced his resignation during a live television broadcast yesterday, saying he would rather stand down than use force against his own citizens. Foreign tourists who flock to the nation’s luxury resorts were not believed to be in any danger.

“I resign because I am not a person who wishes to rule with the use of power. I believe that if the government were to remain in power it would require the use of force which would harm many citizens,” he said. “I resign because I believe that if the government continues to stay in power, it is very likely that we may face foreign influences.”

The British-educated, former journalist was the first democratically elected leader of the Muslim Indian Ocean nation of more than 1,200 islands. But his opponents had recently been holding daily demonstrations and seized on the President’s decision to arrest and detain a judge – accusing him of acting undemocratically.

Among the protesters were members of the police force and yesterday they gathered outside the military headquarters where Mr Nasheed was seeking refuge, in the capital, Male. The mutinying police set fire to an office of Mr Nasheed’s party and seized control of the state broadcaster.

Soldiers fired tear gas at the police and demonstrators who besieged the military facilities, many of then chanting the name of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, the former President who served for 30 years and whom Mr Nasheed beat in a 2008 election. A number of reports have suggested the military persuaded Mr Nasheed to step down.

Last night, the country’s Vice-President, Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik, was sworn into office. It is expected he will oversee a coalition administration until elections are held.

Mr Nasheed was apparently in protective custody, something disputed by his brother, who told the BBC he was being held against his will.

Mr Nasheed could not be contacted. But a source close to the former President told The Independent that police had taken control of all television and radio stations and that officials who worked for Mr Nasheed were not being allowed to leave. “It’s a coup. Elements of the former regime brought down the country’s first democratically elected President,” said the source, who asked not to be identified.

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Maldivian couple held three months in Indian jail over visa issue

A Maldivian couple have been detained in India over a visa issue for more than three months, reports Haveeru.

The paper reported the couple’s son as telling the paper that his parents had asked another Maldivian woman to renew their visa when it was about to expire, and that they had stayed on relying on the documents that were handed to them by the woman. The documents were subsequently identified by Indian police as counterfeit.

The Foreign Ministry told the paper that officials at the Maldivian Embassy had visited the couple. Their case was currently in court and that they could not return to the Maldives until the court concluded the case, the Ministry said.

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Salafists taking root in Maldives amid toxic politics: Reuters

Few of the million or so tourists who visit the Maldives each year would catch even a whiff of the troubled politics or growing militant threat roiling the islands of one of the world’s most renowned get-away-from-it-all destinations, writes Bryson Hull for Reuters.

“Taking a page from the book of Gayoom, Nasheed ordered [Chief Judge Abdulla] Mohamed’s arrest and defied a Supreme Court release order, sparking more than three weeks of sometimes-violent protests by opposition parties that scented a chance for their own Arab Spring in the Indian Ocean.

The reason, Nasheed says, is because the judge, like the other 200-odd criminal court judges, was illegally sworn in for a life term and has blocked every attempt to bring multi-million-dollar corruption, rights abuse and criminal cases against Gayoom’s allies and relatives.

“Gayoom is running the judiciary,” Nasheed said. “When he lost the presidency, he was clever enough to carve out a territory and hide there, or get protected there. And none of the cases are moving.”

So to make good on his electoral promise to enact a new constitution and establish an independent judiciary, Nasheed says he has acted outside of it.

“You have to push everyone to the brink and tell them ‘You do this or we all fall’,” Nasheed told Reuters in an interview at the presidential bungalow in Male, the capital island.

“I think it would be so wrong of me not to tackle this simply because I might fall or simply because people may raise eyebrows.”

And it has done just that, drawing private diplomatic rebukes from Western nations which backed his ascendancy to lead the archipelago of 1,200 islands out of 30 years of Gayoom’s rule, which was widely criticised as dictatorial.

“It’s just indefensible. It’s almost like Nelson Mandela coming out and locking up all the white people,” a businessman based in Male who works with a government-linked company told Reuters, asking not to be identified.

But while the political fray goes on with all eyes on the 2013 presidential election, Maldivian intelligence officers and Western officials say hardline Salafist and Wahabist groups are gaining political ground in the more distant atolls and making a beachhead in Male.

The capital island is home to almost 200,000 of the Maldives’ 330,000 people, all Sunni Muslims. It is also home to the majority of the estimated 30,000 people on the islands who are addicted to heroin, according to UN estimates.

“It’s potentially a tropical Afghanistan. The same forces that gave rise to the Taliban are there – the drugs, the corruption and the behavior of the political class,” a Colombo-based Western ambassador who is responsible for the Maldives told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

“The Salafists are taking over atoll after atoll. They work on the ground and it is insidious. Nero is definitely fiddling while Rome burns.”‘

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Maldives facing serious constitutional crisis: Eurasia Review

There is no doubt that the judiciary in the Maldives is in a mess with many unqualified and incompetent people having made it into the judiciary in the void created during the transition period, writes Dr S. Chandrasekharan for the Eurasia Review.

“The ICJ report of July 2010 pointed out the legacy of an authoritarian past in which the President was the supreme judicial architect that has tested the transition.

“Another factor which inhibited proper selection was that the Judicial Service Commission failed to fulfill the constitutional mandate of properly vetting and reappointing the judges. Even the composition of the commission was questionable. Imagine Gasim Ibrahim being a member – he is a politician and leader of one of the active political parties. He has extensive business interests and there will be an unavoidable clash of interests.

“In the year 2005, the then Attorney General and now a leader of the DQP has himself reported against the judge and the allegations included misogyny, sexual deviance, throwing out an assault case despite the confession of the accused. The Judicial Commission took its own time to enquire into the allegations and meanwhile the judge approached the civil court and stopped the enquiry!

“The judge would have got away with all this but what triggered the anger of the government was that he issued orders for immediate release of two persons from custody – Dr Jameel, the Vice President of DQP and Sandhaanu Didi for asserting in a private broadcasting station that the government was working with the Jews and Christian priests and encouraging vice. Didi went further and made personal attacks against President saying that the President was a madman and a Christian!

“Confronted by the police, the two were not able to substantiate the allegations and were therefore taken into custody under 125 of penal code which said that a ‘person can be punished for making a fabricated statement or repeats a statement whose basis cannot be provided.’

“The Chief Judge of the Criminal Court Abdulla Mohamed ordered the immediate release of the accused and the Police with the help of the MNDF in turn arrested the judge of the criminal court.
Police Sources say that the Judge was arrested for unethical conduct in obstructing the Police in exercising their responsibilities to preserve law and order in the society.

“The High Court ordered the release of the judge stating that the arrest was illegal. The Chief Justice Ahmad Faiz and the Prosecutor General also issued orders for the immediate release of the judge.

“The JSC (Judicial Service Commission) also issued a press note that it is not in the jurisdiction of the armed forces or the Police to take action against the judge.

“The Vice President has in his blog has said that the arrest is against article 319 of the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Further it is against the international covenant of civil and political rights and international convention for the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance. He suggested that the judge should be released and then make the JSC fulfill its responsibilities.

“The Secretary General of SAARC and a former attorney General Fathimath Dhiyana Saeed, the youngest and the first female Secretary General, condemned the arrest in a television programme and said that it is a “violation of individual human rights, a violation of independence of the judiciary and a violation of the constitution.” She has put in her resignation papers after the broadcast.

“A team of lawyers filed a case against MNDF in the High Court over the illegal arrest of the judge. A case has also been filed in the International Court of Justice over the arrest.

“President Nasheed appears to be unrelenting and has justified the arrest. He has separately approached the UN for help in cleaning up the judiciary- immediate issues and the long term issues that includes the failure of the judicial accountability mechanism in the constitution.

“It looks that President Nasheed has over reached himself in firstly arresting and in refusing to release the judge when the overwhelming public opinion is against taking such a drastic action. He should have taken this strong stand last year during the transition when some of the judges appointed by the previous regime were found not having “high moral character, educational qualifications or competence.”
One of the charges against the judge now arrested was that in 2005 he was alleged to have requested the under age victim of molestation to re enact her abuse in court. The charge could not be enquired into by the judicial service commission as the judge got a stay order from the civil court.

“By this one act of arrest, President Nasheed is likely to antagonise all his admirers and sympathisers. Earlier it is undone, better it would be for all concerned.”

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Amana Takaful opens shares for trading Feb 8

Amana Takaful has announced that its initial public offering (IPO) of 800,000 shares will open for trading on the February, along with a further 11,441,187 bonus shares.

The Sri Lanka-based sharia-compliant insurance company had previously announced an IPO of 800,000 shares in September last year.

General Manager of Amana Takaful, Hareez Sulaiman, said in a statement that the total number of shares issued were 20,241,987.

“The Maldives economy, no doubt, has huge potential for growth, but needs foreign and local investments,” Sulaiman said.

“An active stock market is what will attract this investment. Therefore, we expect not only our valued shareholders but also other individuals and corporates to actively take part in the stock market.”

The company had previously shared its hopes of generating Rf16 million (US$1.4 million) in proceeds through the IPO, by selling shares at a low issue price of Rf20 (bundled in packages of 25).

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Government will not yield to “small groups who terrorise and vandalise public spaces”: President

President Mohamed Nasheed has said the government will always respect the people’s voice but will not cave under the pressures of small groups who terrorise and vandalise public spaces.

Speaking a ceremony informing islanders of upcoming development projects in Laamu Atoll Gan, the President declared that street violence will not bring down the government – a statement he claimed was especially clear to himself and his party (Maldivian Democratic Party/MDP).

Referring to the series of anti-government protests which have persisted on Male’ for nearly three weeks, the President said the protesters’ call to release Criminal Court Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed from Special Forces custody stemmed from their frustration with losing power.

He added that the opposition’s attempt to regain power by taking to the streets is a hindrance to national development, further stating that the protests are an abuse of the people’s constitutional right to free expression.

Instead, he requested constructive criticism from disgruntled parties.

Observing that many of the Maldives’ sectors are comprised of educated professionals, he regretted that the judicial courts had not been established along similar lines.

President Nasheed also indicated that all the institutions in every sector of the country comprised of well educated and trained professionals, but expressed his regret stating that he has been unable to elevate the judicial courts to similar standards.

“Our aim is to appoint qualified and responsible Judges to our court houses similar to the standards of the social and economic institutions in the nation,” Nasheed said.

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Chief of Defence Force not responsible for Judge’s arrest: AG

The Attorney General’s (AG) office has said Chief of Defence Force Moosa Ali Jaleel can not be held individually responsible for the arrest of Criminal Court Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed.

The AG had appealed the Criminal Court summons of Jaleel, who never appeared as per the court’s original summons.

Presenting the AG’s appeal at the High Court Deputy Solicitor General Ahmed Usham reminded those present that Judge Abdulla’s lawyers had filed the case against Jaleel at the Criminal Court, citing the judge’s arrest by Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) on the request of Maldives Police Service, local media reports.

Usham contended that the decision to arrest the judge was made by MNDF, which therefore should be summoned to the court. As Chief of Defence Force, Jaleel cannot be summoned over a case with which he has no direct affiliation.

Usham said the Attorney General’s office would represent the MNDF at court in the event that it is summoned.

When asked to specify the reasons why the Chief of Defence Force could not be summoned to court over the matter, Usham referred the court to the AG’s office.

Observing that the constitution requires every person and institution to comply with court orders, the court next inquired why Jaleel had not presented himself at the Criminal Court.

Usham responded that the High Court had issued a counter-stay order.

According to local media, the court will announce its verdict at the next hearing.

Meanwhile, Police Commissioner Mohamed Faseeh has also been prevented from appearing at the Criminal Court by a counter stay order on appeal at the High Court.

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MDP islanders protest failure of justice on Thinadhoo

Gaaf Dhaal Atoll Thinadhoo island court was held under locked conditions by supporters of ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) for failing to administer justice within the courts.

After entering the court room to protest their grievances the islanders were escorted outside by a court official who locked the door. The crowd subsequently grabbed the court keys from the official and later handed them over to police, one islander said.

Gaaf Dhaal Atoll Gadhdhoo court magistrate Mohamed Ragib Ahmed was also prevented from coming to the island today, where he was to rule on a defamation case against MDP council member Mohamed Hassan Didi.

According to local media, Ragib was transported by police on a gulf craft launch to Thinadhoo where approximately 200 MDP supporters prevented him from coming ashore. Meanwhile, five men boarded the launch and several others tailed him back to Gadhdhoo.

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