Comment: Plan B

This article first appeared on Dhivehi Sitee. Republished with permission.

On 19 September 2003 Evan Naseem, an inmate in Maafushi jail was brutally beaten and murdered by police, sparking off pro-democracy protests which ultimately led to the end of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom’s authoritarian regime.

Now, a decade later, the Supreme Court is expected to reach a verdict on whether or not to annul the votes cast in the presidential election held on September 7, the second democratic election ever to be held in the Maldives. A Supreme Court ruling that orders a revote would amount to a court order for an authoritarian reversal – there would be no second round on September 28, or on any other day in the near future.

Tragic as it is, this seems to be the most likely outcome of the hearings, for this road to the Supreme Court is where this election was always going to lead – it was planned this way. No matter what the election results were — if they put Mohamed Nasheed in the lead, the ultimate decision of who wins would be made by the judiciary, the most corrupt and dysfunctional of the three separated powers.

The judiciary is the biggest blunder of the Maldivian democracy. Nowhere near enough effort was made to free it from authoritarian clutches during the two and a half years of democratic governance.

First came the dismissal of Article 285 as ‘symbolic’, leaving all corrupt and unqualified judges on the bench in direct violation of the new Constitution; then the silent coup in the Supreme Court, followed by continuous violations of the Constitution and rule of law by the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), none of which were dealt with adequately.

It was the corruption in the judiciary that contributed most to the events of February 7. The decision taken by the executive and the security forces to arrest the most subversive of judges – Abdulla Mohamed – was the weapon which authoritarians used most effectively to incite agitation and anger against Nasheed’s government, sustaining nightly protests until the police joined the street protesters and, together with those pulling their strings, presented Nasheed with the choice: resign or die.

Of course, the post-coup government took absolutely no action to reform the judiciary. To even expect them to do so would be the height of delusion. In the turbulent aftermath of the coup, former JSC member Aishath Velezinee who had attempted to thwart every one of JSC’s violations of the law, put it all together in book form; and several international experts brought out report after report with recommendations on how to reform the judiciary – to no avail. Most disappointingly, MDP, despite the bitter lessons of the past, took no concrete action either.

By July this year, judicial corruption had got to the stage where a judge could continue to sit on the Supreme Court bench despite being caught on camera having sex with three prostitutes in a Colombo hotel room. This man, Ali Hameed, will be one of seven men who will today decide whether or not our votes count.

That this is where it will all come to was becoming clear in the lead up to the election when Gayoom’s Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) began making noises about going to the courts if there were discrepancies in the vote count.

While MDP and Mohamed Nasheed never stopped campaigning since the CoNI report in August 2012, which – with the blessing of the international community – legitimised the coup, PPM candidate Yameen hardly ever left the comfort of his own house to meet with the people whose votes he supposedly needed to be elected as president.

Ever since the election in which the Maldivian people resoundingly endorsed Mohamed Nasheed and said an equally loud ‘No’ to Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik – the large façade that helped block from view the dirtiness of the coup – the entire country has been plunged into manufactured ‘uncertainty’ over the results.

First Gasim Ibrahim of Jumhooree Party went into hysterics, maintaining that he was the winner ‘if you minus the 90,000 votes’ that Nasheed received. Backing him are the same dark forces working in the name of religion that so cleverly contributed to the coup. Adhaalath Party’s Sheikh Imran Abdulla, Islamic MinisterShaheem Ali Saeed, Sheikh Ilyas Abdulla, and lately Salaf Jamiyya’s star preacher Sheikh Adam Shameem, have all come out to call for an uprising against ‘the Godless Nasheed’ in the name of Islam.

The idea is to provoke, provoke, and provoke MDP supporters and other democracy activists to come out on the streets in protest so that the security forces can crack down on them, creating an environment in which holding elections become ‘unsafe’. So far, the MDP has been able to keep calm and continue with their campaigning for the second round, deliberately ignoring the relentless smear campaign against Nasheed and the daily negative campaigning, even the ridiculous black magic and sorcery antics. But for how long?

In parallel with all this has been the forward march towards the courts. Gasim Ibrahim led it, but who is pushing him? In the beginning, it seemed to me almost certain that Gasim and Yameen were in on this together. They cooked up a plan to run for presidency so they can split the votes and then later form an ‘everyone but Nasheed’ coalition that would defeat him in the second round. But, information from a reliable source negated this theory. One individual who left Gasim’s JP shortly after the election to join the MDP relayed this story:

“Former military man Mohamed Fayaz [or F.A, as he is commonly known], one of the main coup-enablers who put his support behind Gasim, advised him to join Yameen following the election results. What else was there for Gasim to do?

Gasim responded with unbridled anger, swore at FA, and told him: ‘I would rather walk into the sea with my wives and children than join Yameen.’”

Gasim is absolutely convinced he should have won. It is clear from the speech he made on September 9 in which he kept talking of his belief that he should have got 70,000 votes, not 50,000. Many have pointed out that Gasim is looking at the election as a business transaction. He poured in enough money to buy 70,000 votes, so he expects to get them. Gasim is, after all, the biggest tycoon in town.

Helping Gasim remain committed to the delusion is running mate Dr Hassan Saeed, once Nasheed’s advisor, then Waheed’s. He respected neither. Shortly after the coup, he was secretly recorded describing Waheed as the weakest politician in the Maldives. Now he’s behind Gasim, advocating in court on his behalf to annul the first round of September 7, not because he believes in Gasim’s ability to be President, but because it will prevent Nasheed from returning to power – Hassan Saeed’s (and a fair few coup leaders’) reason for being.

Gayoom and Yameen, ever the political vultures, have swooped in on the carcass of Gasim’s dreams, seeing it as the opportunity they have been waiting for, if not working behind the scenes to create. They have brought out to advocate on their behalf one of their big guns – Attorney General Azima Shakoor, the woman of void ab initio fame who annulled the largest foreign investment agreement in the history of the Maldives with the stroke of a pen and absolutely zero respect for national or international law.

Without so much as asking the Elections Commission about the alleged discrepancies in the vote registry, she was busy all day Wednesday arguing against the institution. As is habitual for PPM and other coup-makers, she cited the Constitution to justify her presence – Article 133 allows the Attorney General to enter into any case if it involves the interests of the people and/or State.

Problem is, she is not advocating on behalf of the people or the state but for Gayoom, her master since childhood. PPM and JP are taking strength from each other. The courts (including the High Court) have asked for evidence of discrepancies to back their claims, which neither party have been able to provide so far. Yesterday Dr Saeed argued that such evidence is unnecessary; given that the Attorney General – the Attorney General! -has stated that there are discrepancies.

What evidence does the court need when it has the AG’s word? It matters not that she has been lying through her teeth, saying that the National Registration, too, has filed several complaints against the voter registry at the Elections Commission when the registry has done no such thing.

Elements of the police, most likely the very same ones that enabled the coup on February 7, are in on it, of course. As the court asks for evidence, they are busy manufacturing it. Operation Blue Wave – the ominous strategy of providing ‘special training’ to hundreds of policemen and women and stationing them across the country to prepare for ‘inevitable discrepancies’ – is now bearing fruit. Despite the confirmation from over a thousand domestic and foreign observers that it was a free and fair election with a bare minimum of errors and absolutely no room for vote stuffing, the police are finding fresh ‘rigging’ attempts on a daily basis.

Despite renewed appeals from both local and foreign actors to respect election results, circulating on the social media today is also a ‘leaked’, ‘secret’ report of eight pages that count thousands of instances of alleged vote fraud. What this forgery resembles most is the similarly constructed CoNI report of August 2012. But, of course, there will be many hundreds who will believe it. Just as there are thousands who still believe the CoNI report.

To spur on the radical elements within the security forces, leaders of the ‘Godless Nasheed’ anti-campaign, the ‘rent-a-sheikhs’, have been targeting the police and military in their hate-mongering. Not satisfied with mentioning them in every public lecture as custodians of Maldivian nationalism and Islam, Sheikh Adam Shameem addressed them in two special lectures intended especially for them yesterday and early this morning.

Shameem’s hate-filled public lecture – broadcast on state TV and repeated on the private channels owned by coup-makers – was frightening, arguing against democracy, especially multi-party democracy, as a Western evil imported to destroy Maldivian faith in Islam. If this is what he said publicly, one can only imagine what he told the security forces in their barracks.

What the plan seems to be right now is this: the Supreme Court is to rule today that there must be a revote, which means that there will be no second round on September 28, nor a President by November 11, as is stipulated in the Constitution. Already, Madam Void ab Initio has voided void itself, saying not having a president would not leave a power vacuum.

If this Plan B is implemented, it is inevitable that the electorate, 88 percent of whom turned out to vote on September 7, will feel dejected, disheartened, and angry. Chief among them will be the 95,000 people who voted for Nasheed and against the coup and the authoritarian reversal. They will pour out onto the streets, just like the thousands who did on the streets of Male’ on February 8. If this happens, the final phase of Plan B will be implemented: rogue elements within the security forces led by coup-makers will crackdown on them brutally, violently, and without conscience. And with their batons and their bullets, they will try to kill all hopes of restoring democracy in the Maldives in any foreseeable future.

But, as Mohamed Nasheed said earlier this week, it is unlikely that Maldivians will let democracy die, having fought so long and come this far.

“People might try to rig two or three elections. [They] might try to arrest some people. And there might even be three or four coup d’etats. But, overall, I don’t see this curve slumping too much.”

The fight in which most of the country joined in 10 years ago from today is set to continue, for as long as it takes.

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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“God Willing, Gasim will be President on November 11”: Gasim

This article was first published on Dhivehi Sitee. Republished with permission.

On the evening of September 9, two days after Maldivians voted in the country’s second democratic elections in which Mohamed Nasheed emerged with a resounding victory, Gasim Ibrahim’s Jumhooree Coalition launched a series of rallies under the name ‘Rigged Vote! Rigged Vote!’. Together with its ally, the radical ‘religious’ Adhaalath Party, the Jumhooree Coalition has been claiming that at least 20,000 additional votes were cast on 7 September. This is the second in Dhivehi Sitee’s English translations of speeches at the ‘Rigged Vote! Rigged Vote’ launch rally. Today, extracts from the speech by leader of Jumhooree Party, Gasim Ibrahim:

Yes, we know without a doubt that the number of votes we got in the provisional results announced by the Elections Commission is not the amount of votes people gave us. I understand very clearly that more than 70,000 Maldivians voted for us. We will never forgive, never forgive, this major crime committed by the Elections Commission. Will never forgive, okay?

It is not 50,000 votes that I got from Maldivians. I know this because how were dead people voted for, those votes counted and included in the list? When there are such huge responsibilities to be assigned and when such big changes are made, I must say the people responsible must hurry to deliver the right. They must hurry. We don’t appoint people to positions so they can say this is a power in our hands and harass and badger.

I am saying it very clearly, we have no doubt that the High Court and the Supreme Court, too, will deliver us our right. Yes, in ‘critical moments’ like this, my appeal to the courts is to hurry up. See it as a right and give us a judgement fast. I have no doubt these courts will rule this way. That is, the courts will see this as a right and come to that decision fast. I don’t believe that at a time like this, when the entire peoples’ future rests and builds on this that such things should get stuck. I don’t believe that something like this should be open to influence or power from outsiders.

What I want to say is, the MNDF and or police and army of the national security force must give the protection they must give to our judges. Especially in a moment like this, when their protection and security is of such importance, I beg the president of the Maldives. I ask for the protection of those people [judges].

Yes, even in a short period of about eight hours, we have found about 800 dead people. We can check this out properly when we get the voters lists from the polling stations. We are certain that about 20,000 votes have been cast against the law and procedures. That is why the results show we have less votes than we got. I don’t know whether the votes we got have been rigged and moved from this side to that side.

What is certain is that it is not 50,000 votes that we got. I believe the result should have more than 70,000 votes. Those are people who joined us and supported us. These people are sobbing in all corners of the country, shedding tears of pain and crying: ‘this is not the reality, so many crimes have been committed. We saw people, dressed in a particular colour, closing up the cote boxes with shaking hands.”Yes, I am telling you about Laamu Atoll. A person monitoring near one of our vote boxes there told me s/he saw a person wearing a yellow shirt closing a box in this state.

We are leading. We are leading. When you minus that 90,000 votes [received by MDP], we are the leaders. Yes, when you subtract 20,000 from those 90,000, I believe it is us who are in the lead.

We know it is our vote that was changed. I am telling you what I believe. I am telling you what I believe. Maldivians, have courage. I am ready to make any sacrifice with my body and my money to bring you Maldivians a happy and prosperous life. We will not give in to anyone. This talk of me hospitalised for a heart attack — these are all blatant lies to dishearten you. This talk of me endorsing this person or endorsing that person. We will endorse when we have to endorse. But today we don’t have to endorse. There is nobody we will endorse. God willing, it is others who will have to endorse us. We don’t have to endorse anyone. We are not in such a position yet.

Even if you have to vote twice or thrice, I tell you, don’t hesitate. Do as we say. Like Imran said, we will tell you what the most right, most sincere decision is for the sake of this nation, this land. When we tell you this decision, I call on you to double the support you have for us and decide to work with us.

God willing, it will be Gasim Ibrahim who will be the President of the Maldives on 11 November. Allah willing, do not doubt this. I tell you, do not doubt this.

Ask Allah for strength. Pray to Allah. Get strength from Allah and pray. That then is how Allah will decide things. There is no other calculation than this [Allah’s]. What I am telling you is the Right. Even if some people are deceiving you, the Right will win, Allah willing. Allah has guaranteed victory for the Righteous. Reminding you of this will give you Maldivian citizens strength and good thinking. I am ending this with the prayer that God will give you the ability to think right.

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Comment: Yesterday, on the sunny side of life

This article first appeared on Dhivehisitee. Republished with permission.

Before the morning sun warmed up for the day, a white-truck with two big megaphones sticking out from the back began driving round and round the island. A woman’s voice, shrill, almost hysterical, called out to ‘all ye citizens’ and ‘the entire Maldivian Ummah’ to attend a Jumhoree Party rally at 9:00 in the evening. Her voice forced its way into my mind like a buruma [drill], resistance was futile. Jumhoree Party (JP) is contesting the election results, as everyone in Male’ knows by now; whether they want to or not.

Just in case the drill had missed a few heads, JP organised a press conference around noon. Ibrahim Khaleel, JP spokesperson and Ilham Ahmed, PPM MP for Gemanafushi constituency, led the affair. According to Khaleel, JP has a whole army of experts, ‘even foreign experts!’, scrutinising the results ‘on behalf of the people’. They have allegedly found 20,000 more votes than there are eligible voters. Over five hundred of them were dead. The rest may have been foreigners or aliens, or perhaps jinnis or even cursed coconuts.

Khaleel, a former TV presenter Qasim has bought for an undisclosed amount of money, was outraged on behalf of his Master. ‘Even my name, my name, already had a tick against it when I got to the polling booth’, he said. For a millisecond I thought his name was on the ballot paper itself. But, no, it was on the voter registry, audaciously and fraudulently ticked by some devious Elections Commission secret agent before Khaleel cast his vote. Didn’t these people know who Khaleel is? Perhaps they aren’t on Facebook, some users of which are reportedly rather intimately acquainted with Khaleel.

PPM’s Ilham couldn’t wait to jump in with his own anecdotes of voting woes. He personally knew two foreigners, ‘two of them(!)’ who voted on Saturday. They were now under lock and key, their fingers bearing the ‘I voted’ indelible ink on their left index fingers most likely put away in separate glass boxes, waiting for the right time to be revealed to the public. In contrast to the foreign digits under JP’s protective custody, Ilham’s right index finger was fancy free. It kept jabbing the air, probably making Qasim Ibrahim—who thinks the gesture is terribly, terribly uncouth—cringe with every poke. It made me notice the gleaming gold watch on Ilham’s wrist, which is probably the intended effect. It completed the chav look Ilham seems to aspire to.

Ilham called for the resignation of the Elections Commission. ‘They must resign now! For the sake of the baby growing inside me, resign now!’ My eyes stopped following his finger and focused on his face, gleaming with a sheen of sweat mixed with the gel that holds his carefully constructed fringe in place. This was big news. MP Ilham is pregnant. Well, anything is possible in Male’ these days. If a sitting president can still sit after a five percent vote; if a Supreme Court judge can still remain on the bench after being caught on camera fornicating with three prostitutes; if a member of the Civil Service Commission can still turn up to office after being removed from the position multiple times for sexually harassing a civil servant…a pregnant man appears almost mundane. None of the journalists present took note. Perhaps this is the reason why Ilham launched into a tirade against their lack of professionalism shortly after.

‘I was a journalist myself for years! Years!,’ he said. Oh? He proceeded to share everything he knew—all of five minutes worth—about journalism. Apparently, journalists can’t ask questions. Their role is to take notes. Reporters are glorified stenographers, really, according to Ilham. It was just past noon, and I felt thoroughly educated.

As the sun set, the shrill mega-phone lady was still going round and round the island. Hush-a-hush-a, or I’ll fall down, I thought. No such relief. The only thing left to do was to attend the rally—if you can’t beat them, join them. But JP’s was not the only major gig on, PPM was also hosting a rally at the same time, on the opposite side of the island at Alimas Carnival.

MNBC One news had reported Dr Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik, the world’s most unpopular sitting president, was to make an appearance. I was spoilt for choice — should I go to JP’s hate-festival or to the President’s post-First Round debut. I decided the latter line-up was the one not to be missed. Adhaalath’s rent-a-sheikhs have an endless supply of hate, there would be more tonight and every night after that until 28 September.

Alimas Carnival stage did not disappoint. All sorts of clever lighting made the area look a bit like Glastonbury at night. Except the festival goers could not have been more different. Most were over fifty, at least. Except one or two, every woman wore a headscarf. Not the trending burugaas that make a large share of today’s modern Maldivian women look like they have a beehive sitting on top of their heads, but the more ‘truly religious’ big black ones.

All in all, there were about a thousand people, sitting on plastic deck chairs or milling about on foot or sitting on motorbikes. Three large screens stood adjacent to each other, taking up most of the large stage. When I got there two of the three screens had a picture of Mohamed Nasheed with a black band covering his eyes, and the one in the middle screamed in bold red letters, ‘No!’ For some reason, medieval church-type music played on the speakers, alternated with ‘patriotic’ songs glorifying the coup of 7 February 2012.

PPM’s rally was not about PPM and what it plans to do for the people should Yameen Abdul G-g-g-ayoom win the Second Round but about saying ‘No to Nasheed.’ Excuse me, Kenereegey Mohamed Nasheed, as PPM lurves to call him. As if that would make him any less a former President.

MP Ahmed Nihan, a man who derives energy from an endless supply of hate contained within, bounded onto the stage, much to the delight of the ladies. It was like a Tom Jones concert where old(er) women are known to throw their panties at their ageing sex God. At any moment now, I thought, they’d be taking off their burugaas and throwing them at Nihan.

‘Laa Dheenee, Laa Dheenee, Laa Dheenee! Laa Dheene Nasheeeeeeeeed!’, he screamed. Hitler had less veins standing out in his neck during his rallies. The buruga clad women forgot about hell’s fires burning if they so much as giggled, and screamed hysterically, applauding the hate like it was free love.

Speaking of Hitler, Nihan launched straight into anti-Semitism. Israeli newspaper Times of Israel had publisheda report online ‘on 8 September, at 2:33pm(!!!)’ with the headline ‘Ousted Israel-Friendly Leader…’. O.Em.Gee. ‘We all know what friend means, even those of us with the most rudimentary English’, Nihan said, excluding himself from this bracket, of course. ‘A friend of Israel (!!!), we cannot allow such a man to become our leader. Not under any circumstances! Say NOOO to Kenereegey Mohamed Nasheeed!’

And so it continued in this vein, speaker after speaker. Former President Gayoom, who as usual, spoke before the actual PPM candidate Yameen; Mohamed Jameel Ahmed, Yameen’s running mate; Maldives Development Alliance’s MP Siam; and so on. They all had the same message: do not vote for Nasheed.

There were only a couple of deviations from the subject. Nihan made a coy pronouncement that ‘some things have not gone according to announcements in the media.’ President Waheed did not make an appearance. Celebrities, as you know, don’t always turn up when you expect them to, Nihan explained. Another significant declaration issued was by Jameel:

We will not allow Mohamed Nasheed to return to power even if he wins the election.

The grand finale was an anti-Nasheed propaganda video that would give North Koreans a run for their money.

Today is another day, packed with the same sort of ‘campaigning’, no doubt.

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations.

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected].

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Comment: Gasim threatens violence unless declared winner

This article first appeared on Dhivehisitee. Republished with permission.

Presidential candidate No 1 Gasim Ibrahim, who came third on Saturday’s vote count with 24 per cent, has refused to accept the result and threatened to create mayhem on the streets of Male’ until he is declared winner.

“I will be taking the oath on 11 November,” Gasim declared at a rally held at Maafannu Kunooz, a Jumhooree Party jagaha [hub] in Male’.

And to make that happen, Gasim and his team of agitators will lead the kind of street activities that culminated with the 7 February 2012 coup.

Their strategy goes something like this: a) declare the Elections Commission a corrupt organisation that engineered a 45 percent majority for MDP candidate Mohamed Nasheed through fraud; b) denigrate Nasheed as Laa Dheenee [godless] scum who would erase Islam from the Maldives; c) ‘protest’ on the streets of Male’ until security forces are forced to crack down on them; d) make a free and fair democratic election impossible.

“People have been convicted and punished for stealing a spoon, an egg. But nothing has been done against the man who violated our Constitution,” Sheikh Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed, current Islamic Minister, screamed into the microphone.

‘We have to save our country and citizens from Nasheed’s Laa Dheene philosophy. Under no circumstances must we allow him to become our leader again,’ he said, calling upon the ‘Maldivian Ummah’ to rise up against him. Scores of men and women clapped and shouted ‘Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar!’

One after another the most prominent hate-mongers in the country came on stage – Sheikh Imran Abdulla, the leader of Adhaalath; State Minister of Home Affairs Abdulla Mohamed [Madhanee Ablow]; and Umar Naseer, Commando in Chief of the Coup. Looking on, applauding and cheering the hate and fitna were Gasim-allied dignitaries such as Gayoom’s brother-in-law Ilyas Ibrahim and Abdulla Kamaldeen, and educated people who should know better like Gasim’s running-mate Dr Hassan Saeed.

The speakers threatened Elections Commissioner Fuwad Thowfeek and mocked his wife as a supporter of the MDP. Umar Naseer ended his threats against Thowfeek by saying: “If you want to leave the country, you should do it now.”

Umar Naseer threatened violence, saying neither he nor Gasim or any of their followers will hesitate to spill their blood ‘for God and country.’

Expect similar hate-mongering for the next four nights, after which they will come out on the streets “until the Elections Commission gives in and declares the first round last Saturday null and void, or Gasim the winner.”

I am not sure how many international observers for these elections are still in Male’, or how many of them watched this hatred being spewed out live on Gasim’s VTV. It was all in Dhivehi, but there were many warnings intended for international ears.

“This is an internal matter that no foreigners have any say in. Stay out of it,” several of them, especially Sheikh Shaheem, declared repeatedly.

I hope the observers are, at the very least, taking note of all this and listening to the threat that Umar Naseer put thus: “Mohamed Nasheed will not be able to win these elections, whatever it takes.”

If these threats fall on deaf ears, it will be easy to make the same mistake as last time when the Commission of National Inquiry [CoNI], endorsed by the Commonwealth, ruled that the 23 nights of protests that led to the end of Nasheed’s government were “spontaneous” and “natural”.

There is nothing natural about any of this.

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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Comment: A Jumhoree Maldives?

This article was first published on DhivehiSitee.com. Republished with permission.

I went with a friend to the Jumhoree Maalan on Majeedhee Magu last night to get a copy of the Jumhoree Party manifesto.

The Maalan is a vast space of two floors, on a piece of land well over 2000 square feet. Part of it, towards the back, is cordoned off with a big red banner saying ‘Voting Booth’. Two men sat at a table to the side – they looked the closest thing to receptionists we could find. We asked them for a manifesto.

For some reason, the request surprised them. They called over a harried looking man, ‘Ahammadhey’. He agreed to give us a copy and walked over to a room at the back with a big bunch of keys. JP manifesto is kept under lock and key, like a tightly guarded trade secret. He brought us each a little leaflet, a six page summary of the People’s Manifesto: Development Certain.

The frontpage is an illustration of JP’s vision for Maldives. There’s a small island to the far right, connected to an ‘Islamic city’ rising from the sea. The entire shoreline is dominated by a mosque which itself dominates a university standing adjacent, to the left. There’s one or two trees, a crane busily constructing more buildings in a concrete jungle.

A father and son are at the forefront of the picture, walking into the mosque together. They are the nucleus, the centre of the universe as imagined by JP. A woman is somewhere in the distant background, attending to a little household chore, as women do. The only other person is a figure of non-distinctive gender, standing on a bridge. S/he looks about to jump off it. A Maldivian flag is the tallest of all things, rising above everything except the minaret. Not one but two suns shine down on this JP idyll.

There’s quite a few things—eighty three to be exact— that JP promises will happen to make this vision a reality. It begins with the promise to build an Islamic university, followed by the promise to include Nationalism as a separate subject in the national curriculum. Four regional institutes for ‘Arab Islamic learning’ will be established across the country. Next to religion is crime and punishment. Better forensics, more surveillance, better trained police with its own ‘world class’ Police Academy and an all powerful Anti-Drug Agency that will ‘completely stop’ Male’s thriving drug trade.

We asked Ahammadhey if he could talk us through some of the pledges. ‘I am a masakkathu meeha [handyman],’ he said. ‘I don’t know what’s in it.’Ahammmadhay went to fetch us a man more familiar with what JP wants to do for us people. The resident expert turned out to be Umar Bey [Mohamed Hameed], who used to teach in Majeediyya School and is a familiar figure to thousands, like us, of Male’ voters.

‘Can you tell us a little bit more about the pledges here?’

‘It’s pretty straightforward, is it not?’

‘Can we have a copy of the full manifesto?’

‘I don’t have it. To be honest, I haven’t seen it yet.’

‘It does exist? You have one?’

‘Yes, there’s a big manifesto, it’s printed and everything.’

‘So where is it?’

‘I don’t have access to it.’

‘Who does?’

Umar Bey summoned another person who confirmed there is a manifesto the party can give us, but ‘not right now.’ He asked us to come back another time.

We continued our conversation with Umar Bey.

‘There’s a manifesto published on Scribd by Hassan Saeed, promoted on his FB page. What’s that about?’

‘Haha. That’s not a JP manifesto. That’s Hassan Saeed’s.’

‘Oh? Hassan Saeed has a different manifesto?’

‘He must do. I haven’t seen it.’

We had. A few days ago it appeared on running mate Hassan Saeed’s Face Book page.

The summary we got last night is a summary of Hassan Saeed’s manifesto on Scribd: build an Islamic state where religion, together with nationalism — taught as a subject in the national curriculum — will inform all socio-political and juridical decisions and conduct of society and individuals. It also speaks of ‘maintaining’ this traditional Islamic state, as if this is not an imagined place yet to be created but the way we have always lived.

I wonder how many people intending to vote for Gasim Ibrahim know the Maldives they are voting for.

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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Comment: Election 2013 – where to, people?

This article first appeared on DhivehiSitee’s Election 2013 hub. Republished with permission.

It has been 569 days since the coup of 7 February 2012. We have walked a long way back in those five hundred odd days.

State-sponsored violence has returned with a vengeance, along with arbitrary arrests and detentions. Precious civil liberties – freedom of expression and freedom of assembly among others, have been scaled back to alarming levels. Basic human rights—freedom from arbitrary arrests, detention, torture and other state-sponsored violence – have been taken away.

Xenophobic nationalism coupled with radical religious ideologies has damaged not just our relations with each other but our relations with the rest of the globalised and inter-connected world of today. From a respected actor punching far above our weight in international relations, we have become a nation viewed as a ‘terrorist hotbed’ dominated by radical Islamist thought with little respect for universal human rights.

Foreign investors have been scared away, international financial agreements reneged on and international treaties cut up and thrown out. Corrupt oligarchs and self-interested government officials have negotiated our sovereignty to appease the national interest of big powers while petty crooks posing as cabinet ministers have sold or rented out our precious natural resources to international gangsters and unethical international business partners for hefty sums that line only their own pockets.

We as a people, once united by a shared belief in our own moderate Muslim identity, are now more divided than ever before, torn apart by the political abuse of religion as a form of absolute control over our hearts, minds and lives. Facts have been sacrificed in the construction of a particular truth, reality itself has become what the rulers tell us what it should be. It seems like we have lived five hundred years in the last five hundred days, all roads leading back to the past, further and further away from the world at present and what it looks set to become in the days to come.

It can all change in the next week. On 7 September 2012 we will decide whether to stay on this road to the past, or return to the present and back to the future. On the other side of this inter-connected world, in the Middle East especially, we have watched the ‘Arab Spring’ unfold. We were ahead of other countries in the ‘Islamic world’ in making a peaceful democratic transition. And we were ahead of others, like Egypt, in having the heady joy of a revolution killed by an authoritarian reversal that took the form of a coup.

Analysts have identified an emerging trend among such countries of an ‘authoritarian push-back‘. Judging from the number of people who have failed to see the events of 7 February 2012 in the Maldives as a coup, both home and abroad, we may well fall within this new trend. Or, we can prove the analysts wrong like we did those who believed peaceful democratic transition is impossible in an Islamic country. We can say no to the authoritarian push-back, preempt the forecasted trend before it can even begin. The choice is ours to make on 7 September.

Let us make it an informed one.

Candidate 1: Gasim Ibrahim

Gasim Ibrahim (61) [or Qasim Ibrahim after re-branding for the campaign] is the candidate for Jumhooree Party. Gasim’s main ally isthe Adhaalath Party, the most politically active ‘Islamic organisation’ in the country.

Candidate Gasim’s defining characteristic, as put forward by him and his campaign team, is that he is the richest man in the country. Gasim is the owner of Villa Group, the largest company in the Maldives with 6000 employees. According to Gasim’s Wikipedia page, although ‘his net worth has not been made public’, it is ‘believed to be in access of 500 million dollars’. Gasim’s properties include several luxury tourist resorts, uninhabited islands, and shipping, fisheries, fuel, construction and manufacturing as well as import/export companies. Gasim also runs Villa High School and Villa College, which, although money-making businesses, he also aggressively promotes as evidence of his philanthropy along with a large number of study loans he has provided for many Maldivian students to study abroad.

Gasim’s chief selling point is his ‘rags to riches’ biographical narrative. Born to a blind father on the island of Dhiddhoo in the neighbouring Alif Atoll, his mother died when he was 39 days old. Gasim was brought up on Maamigili island by his grandmother and other relatives until he came to Male’ at a young age, ending up as a servant boy in Endherimaage, the unofficial residence of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom. Gasim’s chief patron in the house was Ilyas Ibrahim, Maumoon’s brother-in-law. That Ilyas, a powerful political figure throughout Gayoom’s reign, is now working under Gasim to promote his presidency, is another glorified strand in Gasim’s poor boy made millionaire narrative. Another celebrated one is that Gasim, who did not receive any formal education, was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Open University of Malaysia in December last year.

Gasim’s chief pledges are in line with his multimillionaire identity. In addition to laptops and iPads for all children and more materialistic goods to all voters and various constituencies, the Jumhooree Coalition has also pledged that a win for them would ensure everyone in the country will have the opportunity to ‘be a Qasim’. Last Friday Gasim donated a large number of equipment — computers, air-conditions and LCD TVs to schools in Addu City, but has denied it is a bribe intended to influence the elections.

What Gasim’s campaign carefully omits from all discussions about his wealth is his enormous debt. While Gasim was the Minister of Finance (2005-2008), the state-owned Bank of Maldives approved loans to Gasim’s Villa Group worth almost US$ 40 million (US$37,601,520) — 32.4 per cent of the bank’s entire capital. The Finance Ministry, which Gasim headed at the time, held a 51 per cent veto over any decision of the Bank of Maldives board, of which he was also a non-executive member.

Gasim is also presenting himself to voters as a champion of Islam and has formed an alliance with the ‘Islamic party’, Adhaalath, to ‘defend Islam’. This part of his campaign appears geared towards the not insubstantial segment of the voter population that prefers a manifesto for the afterlife to one for here and now. Given Adhaalath’s goal of making Sharia the only source of law in the Maldives, Gasim’s alliance with the party means that a win for him is likely to bring the country closer to Adhaalath’s dream of the Maldives as an ‘Islamic state’ belonging to a revived global Caliphate.

Personal Tidbits

Gasim has four wives, the maximum allowed for a Muslim man, and 12 children, seven boys and five girls. His oldest is studying for a Master’s and the youngest is less than two years old. He also has six grandchildren. Gasim is reputed to have a hot temper and a reputation for not being the politest man in politics. One of his wives has said he is a very ‘caring and sharing’ husband who answers the phone no matter where in the world he is. Another says he is ‘very kindly’, and that he has never spoken to her in anger. Gasim has said that he married four women to increase his chances of having a daughter.

Why should you vote Gasim?

In his own words:

Maldivians would know very well that there is no other reason for me to contest these elections except to bring them the development and progress they want. If I were driven only by personal interest or my own business interests, I wouldn’t need to be running for this position. Anybody who gives it serious thought will know that what I am doing is making their development certain. In the same breath, every Maldivian who gives it serious thought will also be certain that I will not touch even a penny from our treasury; that I will not allow room for hatred to spread in this country; that I will get the economy back up and running; that with God’s help I will establish justice to their satisfaction; I will not let our independence and sovereignty be disturbed even the slightest; and that I am ready to spill my blood on this ground in protecting our glorious and sacred religion and independence. Every person who gives this some thought will know that they must vote for me as President of the Maldives.

-RiyaaC Programme, MNBC One

Candidate 2: Mohamed Waheed

Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik (60), is the incumbent President, running as an independent candidate. Waheed took oath on 7 February 2012, a few hours after Mohamed Nasheed resigned under duress. Until then Waheed was Nasheed’s Vice President. Waheed insists his presidency is legal, a claim legitimised by the Commission of National Inquiry (CoNI) ruling a year ago that the events of 7 February 2012 did not amount to a coup d’état.

Waheed’s chief selling point to voters has been a claim to calmness, an ability to remain undisturbed in extreme turbulence. As evidence of this, Waheed has pointed to his two inaugural speeches at the Majlis, delivered amid riotous heckling by MDP MPs and large protests outside. According to his brother Ali Waheed, it is down to Waheed’s infinite patience and unflappability that the streets of Male’ are not completely chaotic as they were in the immediate aftermath of the coup. With a long and illustrious career in the United Nations behind him, Waheed’s campaign also projects him as a man of the world with the kind of international experience that all his rivals lack.

Waheed has been described by Hassan Saeed, then his chief political advisor as ‘politically the weakest person in the Maldives‘, and his 18 months as acting president has been disastrous for both him and the country. He has presided over a shocking decrease in freedom of expression and other civil liberties as well as the biggestincrease in state-sponsored violence since democratic rule began. Waheed’s government has entirely failed to take any steps towards crucial judicial reform, has been dogged by massive economic problems, and has damaged foreign investor confidence with a range of bad decisions, especially the decision to void GMR’s airport development contract. Waheed insists none of this has anything to do with him and maintains that he has support of ‘the silent majority’ which he estimates to be about 90 percent of the population.

Personal Tidbits

Waheed makes a mean lamb/beef curry, shares domestic chores with his wife Ilham Hussein, loves cycling and listens to Ghazals. He has three grown-up children, two of whom are as involved in his political life as his wife. Until recently, his youngest, a son, was known as Jeffrey but is now referred to as Salim, perhaps to appease the radical Islamists who insist on Arabic names for children as proof of the parents’ Islamic beliefs. His wife Ilham, who is also his first girlfriend, has said what she admires most about him is his morals and good manners.

Why should people vote for Waheed?

In his own words:

I believe that today the Maldivian people want a leader who will take the nation forward calm and steady. People who can bring the necessary development and reforms as smoothly as possible. I have shown this to the best of my ability in recent days. This is a difficult time. This is an unusual time in Maldivian history. It is a time of exceptional change, a time which requires that we go forward with some amount of maturity, calm and steadiness. It requires development of the whole country without personalising the difficulties, by looking at the big picture. We have to find a way to continue with the democratic work that has already been started. I believe that our brothers and sisters will carefully look at all candidates. When they do, I believe that I will receive a lot of support.

-RiyaaC Programme, MNBC One

Candidate 3: Abdulla Yameen

Yameen Abdul Gayoom (54) [also known as Abdulla Yameen] is PPM’s [Progressive Party of Maldives] candidate and brother of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom who ruled Maldives from 1978-2008. The defining characteristic of Yameen’s candidacy is, in fact, this family relationship—a vote for Yameen, the electorate is told on a daily basis, is a vote for Gayoom; electing Yameen would be a re-election of Gayoom by proxy.

Yameen’s chief selling point is that he is an economist and as such someone who can manage the country’s bankrupted finances better than any other candidate. Giant billboards appeared all over Male’ in the early days of the PPM campaign, some with quotations from famous world economists, as evidence of Yameen’s economic competency. Yameen has also promised to concentrate on making things better for the country’s youth, the most troubled and troublesome segment of the Maldivian population.

Several accusations of corruption, including alleged involvement in an international money laundering racketworth US$800 million with ties to the Burmese junta have been levelled against Yameen. He denies the allegation and all others, describing them as ‘baseless and unfounded‘. Yameen is known for his tendency to sue for libelagainst anyone who makes or repeats such accusations, sometimes claiming millions in damages purportedly for no other reason than to ‘vindicate his good name.’ Apart from the promise to bring back the policies and characteristics of brother Thuththonbe’s [Gayoom’s] rule, one of Yameen’s main pledges to voters has been his promise the plan to restart his earlier attempts to explore for oil in the Maldives. Most of Yameen and PPM’s campaign has otherwise concentrated on criticising rival Mohamed Nasheed, the Maldivian Democratic Party candidate and others.

Personal Tidbits

Yameen has a hard time smiling, a fact which his campaign has sought hard to remedy with several friends appearing on MNBC One’s RiyaaC programme with Yameen to insist on how much fun he really, really is. He is, the PPM campaign has insisted, ‘a seriously funny man’, and it is a mistake to view his normal ‘reserve’ as arrogance. Yameen has three children, oa six-year-old boy and two grown-up children. His wife Fathimath Ibrahim is an active member of his campaign, although both his older children he says, absolutely hates the fact that he is in politics. When he appeared on the RiyaaC programme, he was shown relaxing at home with a book which, on close inspection, appears to be Heart Work by Chan Chin Bock [Publisher: Singapore: Economic Development Board] – more evidence of his competency as an economist.

Why should you vote Yameen?

In his own words:

The only viable option for any Maldivian who wants to make their lives better is to vote for me. [Why?] Because the biggest challenges we currently face are in the economic sector—problems in this area are permeating all others. Why is the health sector not developing as it should? Why cannot we add a new classroom to a school? Why aren’t there more doctors, more foreign doctors? Why are we short of IV fluid? These are all budget, money, dollars and sense, Rufiyaa, Laari, aren’t they? So, to find out how to earn Rufiyaa Laari, to understand how to spend Rufiyaa Laari with the least amount of waste and knowing how to draw the political map is the only way to draw the map and get there. Is it not? That’s why I have said a person who comes to the leadership will come with the aim to do something, not to continue business as usual. That’s why I want to say to all Maldivians: if you want to seriously change things for the better, there’s no need to look at any other candidate in my opinion, okay?

– RiyaaC Programme, MNBC One

Candidate 4: Mohamed Nasheed

Mohamed Nasheed (46) is the candidate for Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) and the only democratically elected president in Maldivian history. He was ousted on 7 February in the coup that was ruled ‘not a coup’ by the Commission of National Inquiry (CoNI).

Nasheed’s chief selling point is his long history of fighting for democracy in the Maldives and his pledge to restore it if elected again. Nasheed’s two and half years in government (November 2008- February 2012) was controversial — people either loved him or hated him. Few were indifferent. The Nasheed administration introduced free healthcare, a basic pensions scheme for the elderly, and a desperately needed transport system that made travel between the islands scattered across 90,000 square kilometres of Indian Ocean easier than ever before. Freedom of expression and other civil libertiesflourished to unprecedented levels during his presidency.

A large share of Nasheed’s time in government, however, was spent fighting the always present threat of an authoritarian reversal, the ‘dregs of dictatorship’ that remained within every branch of government. The opposition majority in parliament blocked several key plans of the administration and opposed judicial reformat every turn, vehemently obstructed Nasheed’s push for taxing the rich, making the executive’s job as difficult as possible in the new democracy.

Throughout his years in power, his administration was also dogged by accusations of nepotism, over-indulgence, and most damagingly, of being ‘irreligious’ [Laa Dheene] and anti-Islamic. Despite the latter, it was also during Nasheed’s presidency that Maldivian religious radicals, liberated by Nasheed’s commitment to freedom of expression, most widely disseminated their hate-filled ideologies ultimately contributing to his downfall.

As a presidential candidate, Nasheed still rouses strong emotions. Tens of thousands—men and women of all ages—clearly adore him. Detractors hate him, refusing to believe he resigned under duress and accusing him of concocting a tall tale about being forced to resign. In their version of the truth, he left the position unable to govern or in a moment of weakness. Despite the allegations, all his opponents acknowledge that he is their strongest rival. In fact, all of them have said he is their only rival.

Personal Tidbits

Nasheed is a history enthusiast who has authored two books. A former journalist and an avid reader, he has said his true passion is writing. He loves animals and kept a whole cage full of birds until he was jailed himself. On returning from prison, he freed them all. He loves spending time with his two daughters and, as a committed weekend-cleaner at home, has said if he loses the election his teenage daughter has suggested they start a domestic cleaning company together. His wife of nineteen years, Laila, has said what she loves most about Nasheed is his great sense of humour.

Why should you vote for Nasheed?

In his own words:

I believe the Maldivian people really wanted to ask ‘why’, and to do something by themselves to find an answer to the ‘why’. They wanted to vote, and to establish a leadership from the results of that vote. They wanted to have more than one person to vote for and to have a competitive political environment . People are realising that it is we who have tried to establish competitive politics in this country and I think they accept what we have done in this regard. People also appreciate what we were able to do in our two years. Our track record in government is good. We did not arrest and torture a single person. We did not seize anyone’s property unlawfully. People really wanted to be free from torture, to be safe from inhumane violence. Our track record on that is impeccable. I also feel that people accept the policies we propose for the future. I believe this year’s election results has almost been decided already. The re-registration of voters casting their ballot paper in places other than their home islands has shown clearly that we will win in one round. God willing, we will win in one round.

– RiyaaC Programme, MNBC One

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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Comment: This is not a dictatorship

This article was first published on Dhivehi Sitee. Republished with permission.

Since the 7 February 2012 coup that was not a coup, a disconcerting dissonance between what people witness with their own eyes and what they are officially told they see has become a regular part of life.

Last week, thousands of voting Maldivians watched the X-Rated video of Supreme Court Judge Ali Hameed having sex with three prostitutes at a high-end hotel in Colombo, Sri Lanka. It was not just his clothes that Hameed shed in front of the people but also his dignity along with the ethical and legal right to sit on the bench. Ethical, because he so carelessly flouted the values of his profession, and legal because the Maldives defines unmarried sex between consenting adults as the crime of fornication.

Yet the official reaction has been like a ticker-tape running across the entire length of Hameed’s sexual marathon saying, ‘This is not sex. This is not zinah. This is not Hameed.’

Gasim Ibrahim, the presidential candidate for Jumhoree Party, has been one of the most vocal defenders of the judge. He asks us to ponder the infinite possibilities of why it was not Hameed in the video: “Anyone can dye their hair red.”

No one can argue with that – not in these days of L’Oréal.

Adhaalath, the self-appointed ‘religious leaders ’ – and the last Maldivian political institution one would expect to favour an informed decision over an ignorant one – has announced it cannot say “Hameed is fornicating” or “Hameed is not fornicating” unless the Judicial Service Commission says “This is Hameed” or “This is not Hameed”.

Until then Adhaalath — or any other government entity — will not see what it sees, nor must we believe our own eyes.

In November last year, 38 MPs in the Majlis agreed that President of the Civil Service Commission, Mohamed Fahmy, was more likely than not to have sexually harassed a female servant as she alleged. They voted to have him removed from the CSC.

Fahmy, though, is still there in the CSC, accompanied by a subliminal government-issue caption designed to appear under every image of Fahmy we come across: “This is not a sexual harasser” or “Sexual harassment is not a crime.”

Back in April this year, pictures emerged of Defence Minister Mohamed Nazim and Tourism Minister Ahmed Adheeb hob-nobbing with the Artur Brothers – Armenian gangsters who were chased out of Kenya in 2006 for heroin trafficking and involvement in the country’s troubled political scene.

Initially the official line was to say it was neither Nazim nor Adeeb hanging with the gangsters. Then came a very Gasim-esque defence: “It is possible that the Ministers and the Brothers were in the same place at the same time. That doesn’t mean they were together as in together together.”

Soon after, pictures emerged of the Brothers at the gala event organised by Nazim and Adheeb to re-open Olympus theatre. This was followed by evidence that one of them was staying in Farukolhufushi, a resort under direct control of Adheeb at the time. Still, the official line was: “This is not happening.”

It was the same with the leaked draft Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) with the United States. Nazim and others denied they saw the leaked version on ‘social media’, but were able to confirm “this is not the SOFA”.

So it was not.

A similar story with the PISCES system gifted by the United States: “This is a border control system” said both governments, and so it is; even though controlling borders is the least of PISCES’ concerns.

Then there were reports of the forged ‘extension’ of the agreement to extend the lease of Farukolhufushi resort, a copy of which was shown on Raajje TV. The authorities have stuck the “This did not happen” label on the incident, so it hasn’t.

Latest in these series of events occurred yesterday, the day marked on the calendar as ‘The Independence Day’. Two events were held to confirm this: one at the museum and one at the Republic Square.

The event at the museum was a reception hosted by Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik and his wife Ilham Hussein for local and foreign dignitaries. It was held in the hall usually reserved for the most precious of national heritage artifacts. Their storage requires specific conditions, their care and handling needs highly trained hands. This is the expert opinion.

The official line, however, is different. In direct contradiction of results of years of study, the President’s Office put out a statement saying: having the party at the museum, or having untrained labourers move the priceless artifacts would not damage them. So it won’t.

Male’ watched as Maumoon Abdul Gayoom was given the highest national award of respect. For 30 years, Gayoom ruled the Maldives without respect for either human freedoms, dignity or the rule of law. It was a dictatorship that stalled economic, social, cultural and intellectual development for an entire generation.

But, the national honour, the shining thing around his neck, screams “This is not a dictator”. So he must not be.

This is a democracy.

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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Island politics: on the MDP campaign trail

This article was first published on DhivehiSitee. Republished with permission.

Only 102 days left until the presidential elections. Four candidates are in the running – Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP); Abdulla Yameen of the Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM); incumbent Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik (of no party); and Gasim Ibrahim of the Jumhoree Party.

There are a record number of eligible voters to persuade: 240,302, to be exact, including over 30,000 additional voters since the first ever democratic elections in 2008.

There is little time left, and much to play for. None of the parties have officially launched their campaigns yet but several candidates – incumbent Mohamed Waheed and tourism tycoon Gasim Ibrahim, most notably – have been travelling the country ahead of the official campaign. The MDP, however, is the only party so far with a clear manifesto, a campaign strategy, and an open-door policy towards the media.

MDP’s initial plan was to take in all atolls in the country in what was called the Vaudhuge Dhathuru (Journey of Promise). March and April were turbulent times with the ‘Opposition Coalition’ doggedly pursuing the aim of putting Nasheed behind bars.

Vaudhuge Dhathuru was suspended, and in its place emerged Dheythin Fahethi (Five From Three) – mostly weekend visits scheduled around the erratic court orders to arrest Nasheed. The move of DRP MP Speaker Abdulla Shahidh to MDP in April, despite his role in the events of 7 February, gave MDP’s travels across the country a new boost and a new name: Eh Burun (In One Round).

In fact, MDP’s elections campaign began unofficially almost as soon it became clear it was the only option left for restoring democracy after the authoritarian reversal of 7 February. In December 2011 came its nationwide Door to Door strategy. Initially conceived of as arecruitment campaign to get ‘every existing member to recruit one more member’, it has now become one of the MDP campaign’s chief strategies.

It has also been a highly rewarding exercise for the party, with 125,000 people already indicating it will vote MDP in September. The pledged 125,000 votes are ‘no folklore’, the MDP has said. They are votes that members have actually pledged during its Door to Door visits to tens of thousands of households.

In a country yet to be introduced to the science of polling or ways to measure approval ratings of candidates, the Door to Door strategy has provided MDP with a wealth of information about potential voters. Currently there are almost a 1000 volunteers across the country, visiting households in every island of every atoll and every area in Male’, discussing MDP manifesto, individual policies, and gauging people’s political attitudes, affiliations and needs.

According to the official party line, this is also the information on which MDP has based the four main policy pledges it has made: the beginning of an agri-business; guesthouses in inhabited islands putting tourism industry wealth within reach of all locals for the first time; mariculture business; and the empowered worker initiative.

Part of MDP’s strategy has been to make each policy launch a colourful event hosted at a different island each time. All atolls participate by releasing it simultaneously in their areas. Each policy is presented in attractive packaging depicting utopian visions of MDP’s ‘Other Maldives’ full of industrious shiny happy people.

Only one atoll, Meemu, remains on Nasheed’s list of atolls to tick-off as having visited since the unofficial campaign began. Nasheed keeps a gruelling schedule, out in the atolls on average 15 days a month, three islands each day, 45 islands each month.

I joined Nasheed’s trip to Haa Alif and Haa Dhaal from 19-21 May to launch MDP’s Agri-Business policy as part of the accompanying media. Continue reading for a behind the scenes, island-by-island (page by page) look at Nasheed’s trips to Hanimaadhoo, Kulhudhuffushi, Kelaa, Filladhoo and Baarah.

Hanimaadhoo

We arrive at Hanimaadho International Airport around 8:30am. The Maldives is experiencing seasonal rains, made especially heavy by a typhoon in the Bay of Bengal. Still, this Saturday morning, the 18 of May, the rain keeps away. The sun is watery, saturating the islands with a softer light than normal. After a night of rain, the lush green vegetation all around looks and smells freshly washed. The sea, just behind the airport’s little coffee shop, is a calm, quiet blue.

After breakfast under a Nika tree with branches that spread wide, we are driven to, Faalsaage, a guesthouse run by Dhonthu (Ibrahim Abu Bakuru) and his wife Ameena, a Male’ couple in their sixties.

Ameena and Dhonthu are typical of a group of core MDP members and activists willing to spend all their available time and energy on securing a win for the party. Dhonthu and Ameena travelled to Hanimaadho the day before Nasheed so they could prepare the guesthouse for the campaign team. MDP bears the cost of renting the rooms and feeding its team, but the rest of what is involved in ensuring the team has a place to call a base during their time in Hanimaadhoo is all effort Ameena and Dhonthu expends willingly, without charge, for the party’s success.

The presence of such people across various atolls of the country, and the successful and strategic exploitation of that rich resource, has emerged as one of the MDP campaign’s core strengths.

At Ameena and Dhonthu’s place there are about a dozen or so men busy festooning the house and its neighbour opposite with yellow MDP flags.

A woman wearing a hijab with only her eyes uncovered is standing under a palm-umbrella weaving a frangipani garland to present Nasheed with. Some men are trying to set up a temporary shelter of sea-blue canvas to provide shade during lunch.

Nasheed is due to arrive in about two hours, and there’s a feast being prepared here and in several kitchens across the island. Ameena is in charge of gathering it all in one place and serving it up. About twenty or so women have volunteered to cook – the plan is to prepare the dishes at home in their own time, and bring them over to Ameena’s for lunch.

As far as the official business of the campaign goes, Shifa Mohamed, Minister of Education in Nasheed’s cabinet, is in charge. The MDP campaign has divided the atolls into seven regions, with one designated head in charge of co-ordinating all efforts in a deignated region. Shifa is the head of the Northern Provices, and area containing the atolls of Haa Alif, Haa Dhaal and Shaviyani.

It is very easy to take to Shifa. She works without pretensions or fuss, and has an easy way with people. Having spent several weeks visiting houses in the area and co-ordinating Door to Door, ‘Shifa Madam’ is familiar to the people. On several occasions, women open up to her, voluntarily speaking of family woes and social troubles without reservation. Shifa is a good listener.

In the garden of Faalsaage, a wheelbarrow full of coconuts appears. One of the men shaves and cut the tips off the young kurumba to serve as a welcome drink when Nasheed and his team arrive. A woman sits at the corner of a table in the garden, frangipani garland in hand. She will be the one putting it around Nasheed’s neck when he comes.

To her right is another smaller table on which now stands a cake. ‘Happy Birthday, our hero,’ says the green and yellow cake. Two women stand near, swatting away flies with the intention of landing on their creation. One of the women is the same one in a hijab I noticed earlier.

“It was Nasheed’s birthday yesterday,” she tells me. There is excitement in her eyes, the only part of her I can see.

“He is our hero,” she repeats what they have already said in confectionary. With only eyes as a guide, I guess her to be anywhere between fifty and sixty years of age. A group of women collected MVR 20 (US$1.30) each, bought the ingredients, baked and decorated the cake, she tells me.

By noon, the steady trickle of women turn into a stream. Having cooked and delivered the food, all the women have returned in their best dresses to greet Nasheed. Almost all are wearing black from head to toe.

It is an astounding change from about a decade ago, when any gathering of Maldivian women would have brought together every colour of fabric under the sun. Today, the only relief from the monotone of black are bolts of canary yellow—women accessorising with yellow burugaas or children dressed in yellow.

When Nasheed arrives there’s close to a hundred women at the guesthouse. There are also about half that amount of men.

Nasheed shakes hands with them all, chats to people over his drink of fresh coconut, cuts the cake to the obvious delight of the women, and disappears upstairs with Shifa, a group of councillors and Hanimaadhoo’s resident campaign team. They will discuss the area’s Door to Door strategies.

Lunch is the feast that it promised to be. There is garudhiya, kulhimas, roshi, all sorts of mas-huni, faiy riha…a whole range of Maldivian dishes that taste as delightful as only island-home-cooked Maldivian dishes can taste.

As Nasheed rests, prays and strategises, I spend the time chatting to some women who still linger. They are waiting to say goodbye when Nasheed leaves for Kulhudhuffushi in a short while.

It is easy to chat with the women. Despite their attire, and the appearance of conservative religiosity, the women were as mischievous and their banter as full of flirtatious double-meanings as women in the region were famed for before Islamists began exercising control over the conduct of their daily lives and faith.

I learn from the women that this part of the island, closer to the airport, is where the people of Hon’daidhoo settled when they were relocated after the 2004 Tsunami wrecked their island. ‘The indigenous people of Hanimaadhoo live over on the other side,’ one of the women tell me.

Most of them, says Mariyam Nazima (35), are also on ‘the other side’ politically—that being supporters of PPM and Gayoom loyalists.

The women are eager to gossip. They tell me Waheed and Ilham have a holiday home on Hanimaadhoo and visited recently. ‘Waheed made it seem like he’s from the island,’ Nazima laughs. ‘But we knew they got land during an earlier decentralisation plan.”

I ask why they like Nasheed. “He’s like one of us. He treats us like equals,” she says. Other women on the jolis beside us agree. “He visits all the houses, rich and poor alike.”

On all islands that I visit with the MDP campaign team, this is what supporters point to as the reason they like Nasheed most: ‘he is one of us’.

Kulhudhuffushi

We arrive in Kulhudhuffushi at about 3:30pm in the afternoon by speedboat from Hanimaadhoo. People line the harbour area to welcome Nasheed. Here there are more men than there were in Hanimaadhoo, but the women still out number them by far. Nasheed will launch the Agri-Business policy at the school hall in Kulhudhuffushi in about half an hour. Close to 200 people attend.

The MDP’s Agri-Viyafari policy is ambitious. The plan is for the government to lease plots of land on various inhabited islands in each atoll, along with equipment, seeds, fertilisers and labourers to anyone interested in setting up a farm. The government will operate a mobile shop, a vessel called Fresh-Isles, which will be perpetually travelling to the islands and buying their produce.

“This way, all farmers will always be guaranteed a market,” Nasheed pledges.

Transporting local products to Male’ and other relatively large markets from their own islands is one of the biggest problems Maldivian farmers encounter today, Nasheed says.

This is a week in which such statements hit home. Newspapers are full of reports lamenting hundreds of thousands of lovely ripe mangoes from Fuammulaku that went rotten for lack of transport in the unusually rough weather. MDP’s AgriBusiness policy means a reduction in such losses.

“Farming should put Rufiya in the pocket, not just food on the table. It’s not about having enough muran’ga leaves to put in your omelette in the morning.” Over the course of the trip Nasheed warms to the muran’ga analogy and repeats it on different islands.

Currently the Maldives imports MVR 245 million (US$18.8 million) worth of agricultural products a year. AgriBusiness aims to slash the amount down to MVR 108 million (US$7 million), Nasheed tells Kulhudhuffushi.

“If we are going to reduce the amount of products we import, then we must increase the duty for those products” ensuring an attractive price for local products.

With plots of land, seeds, equipment and labour readily available for farmers to hire from the government, Nasheed says the AgriBusiness policy would increase national productivity by 1.7 percent. MDP will ensure the creation of at least a thousand agricultural experts in the country and will create 2500 new jobs for implementation of the policy alone.

Nasheed tells the people of Kulhudhuffushi that his government would have the farms and markets up and running within two and a half years. What MDP wants, Nasheed says, is the empowerment of people through their own industry, in public-private partnerships that opens up the country to the globalised market place, and puts money in all local pockets.

As Nasheed’s campaign has progressed, the gist of his speeches at policy launches has been this: Maldivians deserve better than their current hand-to-mouth existence. If people only stop to think about it, the Maldives has rich resources that can make the entire society wealthy rather than a handful of individuals filthy rich. People must reject habits of patronage ingrained in the ‘Maumoonism’ of the last 30-years and vote for an MDP government to, instead, work for a better life for themselves.

Agri-Business offers attractive prospects, and Nasheed is on top form in Kulhudhuffushi, bristling with energy and enthusiasm. Yet, the reaction among the crowd is somewhat muted. Nobody asks any questions when he opens up the floor. There’s applause at some points during the speech, but there is very little spontaneity among the audience.

“Kulhudhuffushi is always a difficult island. People are peculiar,” a campaign team member observes later, when I ask about the muted reaction. What ‘peculiar’ means is not defined by any of the several people who gives me the same response about the people of Kulhudhuffushi—‘eiee varah faadegge baeh’ [they are a very peculiar people].

A more likely explanation is the turbulent politics in the island’s recent history. On 8 February, when the police cracked-down brutally on MDP supporters in Male’, Kulhudhuffushi is one of several islands where people reacted with violence. There was an arson attack on the police station, and a further two incidents of unrest since. When Nasheed visited the island on 27 February 2012, tensions between MDP and PPM supporters broke out into direct confrontations.

At the moment, 28 MDP members (including two councillors) from the island currently stand accused of various charges ranging from terrorism to obstruction of justice. Eleven hearings were held on May 19, the day after Nasheed visited Kulhudhuffushi.

Kelaa

Kelaa is stunningly beautiful. It has long wide roads lined with lush vegetation, and beautiful houses on large plots of land with lovingly tended gardens rich with tropical flowers and fruits. There are several hundred more people gathered at the harbour as the sun sets to welcome Nasheed to Kelaa. The Kelaa crowd is the biggest, and the most unreservedly welcoming so far. In what I can identify as a pattern at this stage, men out-number women. Here, the gender gap is much smaller, though.

In Kelaa, there’s dinner, followed by a campaign speech by Nasheed at the main school hall at 9:30 pm. This rally is apart of Eh Burun (In One Round) segment of Nasheed’s campaign.

There’s excitement in the air. Kelaa supporters of MDP are enthusiastic and passionate about winning the elections. The councillor, Haulath Mahira, is on fire. She loudly denounces policies of the previous government, condemns the February 7 coup, and rallies the crowd to vote for Nasheed.

“We must not let ourselves be dragged back to those days,” she screams into the microphone. The crowd erupts into applause.

Kelaa welcomes the Agri-Business policy with loud hoots, cheers and claps. They are enthusiastic about the prospects and the potential it has for making their farming businesses more successful. The people of Kelaa are already committed farmers.

“We’ll buy everything. Everything,” Nasheed tells them to loud applause. He argues for public-private ownerships that opens the island up to numerous opportunities in the globalised world. Like in Kulhudhuffushi, he talks about forming partnerships with fast developing countries in the region and the rest of the world, and argues against protective nationalism and isolationism.

“We have been too hung up on ownership. Whether our partner in business is foreign or not, Kelaa will always belong to the people of Kelaa.”

Nasheed’s supporters lap up his digs at the opposition’s isolationist approach that has alienated several foreign investors during the last year. This is what the opposition media coverage of Nasheed’s campaign focuses on the next day.

There’s bon’dibaiy after the hugely invigorating rally. I notice a woman wearing a yellowburugaa that has Maldivian Democratic Party printed on it. I wonder if it is unique, this new Maldivian habit of making their Islamic headgear also a political statement.

One woman from Filladhoo told me that there is a brigade of women on the island who support anyone but Nasheed. They change the colour of their burugaa according to party colours of whichever non-Nasheed candidate is visiting the island. Blue for Thasmeen, Pink for Gayoom Yameen, and so on. Talk about a mish-mesh of religion and politics.

We are leaving after breakfast, scheduled for 8:30am. I wake up early and use the time to catch up with an old Kelaa friend, a 44-year-old mother of four, and explore the island a bit. Kelaa is clearly more prosperous than other islands in the atoll.

The houses are large, well-built and modern. Several, however, are empty. Many families are forced to leave their life on the island for Male’ once their children near the end of their secondary school years.

“If we stay, what will happen to my daughter?” Shadiya asks me.

Shadiya, in her forties, lives in a beautiful house, painted completely yellow and boasting all mod-cons of modern luxury with her two daughters. Her husband works on a resort island near Male’, and can only visit occasionally.

Their older daughter is sitting GCE O’Level exams this year. “I want her to get an education, so we must go.” Reluctant to send their children to Male’ on their own for higher eduction, all parents who can afford it leave their comfortable houses for a cramped and difficult life in the city so their children can get the education necessary for university.

It is a sad sight to see, all the lovely houses in Kelaa standing empty and lifeless.

Along the way, we meet my friend’s 8 year-old mother-in-law. She is hobbling slowly with the help of a walking stick. Her mood seems despondent.

“I wanted to go to the harbour to greet Nasheed, but my bad knees won’t let me walk that far,” she explains. “I don’t know if I will live long enough to see him again.”

I have run into an elderly fan of Nasheed. Over the course of the day, I run into many more. Over 65s, I find out, are one of Nasheed’s core support groups.

Breakfast is at the Kelaa MDP Haruge. Yet another feast of Maldivian food prepared by women supporters who had stayed up the night to ensure everything on their candidate’s plate this morning is fresh. There is roshi, mashuni, kulhimas, sweet black tea and various kinds of curry. About twenty women are busy serving, exchanging easy banter, and glowing from the excitement of meeting Nasheed. “He is one of us,” they tell me.

Perhaps this excitement and adoration that Nasheed seems to evoke in his supporters is what incites the opposition’s frequent accusation that MDP is a cult led by Nasheed.

Filladhoo

Filladhoo is a small island with a population just over a thousand. On arrival, like on other islands, there’s coconuts waiting, and the news that forty people had signed for MDP overnight. Twelve of them were waiting to sign their membership forms in front of Nasheed.

Later he holds a policy meeting in the cramped living room of a small house—unlike Kelaa or Hanimaadhoo, there is no dedicated campaign headquarters for the team on this less well-off island.

Just as in Hanimaadhoo, here too, Nasheed’s voice carries loud and clear outside the room onto the street where we wait. The first stop in the door-to-door round of the afternoon is a house owned by an MDP family like Ameena and Dhonthu’s.

The woman of the house, Shaheedha Ismail, 50, has prepared a snack of aveli [an old Maldivian dish] for the team. Nasheed takes gamely to mixing the aveli and chatting to MDP members Shaheedha has invited to join.

One wall of the entire living room is filled with pictures of Shaheedha’s seven children at their respective weddings. Shaheedha, too, is an ardent fan of Nasheed and makes it a point to tell me that she always opens her doors for any activity that will benefit the party.

Why does she like Nasheed so much? “I want someone who lives like us,” Shaheedha says. “He has been very good to my parents.”

During the door to door visits, Nasheed catches up on the fate of a sick child, listens with concern to a woman’s worries about the treatment of her child at school, and is delighted to meet a woman cutting muran’ga leaves.

“This is a picture I want,” Nasheed says. “This is what I have been talking about – when our Agri-Business policy gets going, farming won’t be just about having enough muran’ga to put in your omelette.” There’s childish glee on his face to have come across what he sees as the actualisation of a picture he had earlier created with his words.

In one house Shifa listens to a woman tell her about a 35-year-old daughter with special needs that the State refuses to recognise as being in need of state benefits.

I learn that Filladhoo has been without a doctor, or even a community health worker for over three months. “The Health Ministry says it will send a doctor when it can,” she tells me. There is no knowing when that will be.

What happens in case of emergency?

One of the MDP volunteers tells me there were two emergencies in the last month – a school boy broke his arm and a man fell off a coconut tree breaking his leg. Both had to be taken to Kulhudhuffushi, all costs born by the patients and their families.

Previously, the people of Filladhoo could take a ferry to the island of Dhiddhoo for Rf20. Dhiddhoo has a hospital. But the ferries have been discontinued since the coup and anyone in Filladhoo unfortunate enough to suffer an illness or injury must hire a Dhoni for over 2000 Rufiyaa to take them to Kulhudhuffushi.

“Filladhoo’s pregnant women now travel to Kulhudhuffushi in their eighth month – with no doctor on the island, none of the women want to risk labour complications. Most have to stay in rented accommodation, accumulating huge expenses families find hard to bear”.

On the road back to the jetty, we meet a woman well in her eighties who cannot recall her exact age.

She is out on the street, holding her daughter’s hand to steady herself, on the off-chance of running into Nasheed. Nasheed chats to her easily, and tries to calculate her age from her earliest memories. She remembers Hassan Fareed very clearly, she says. Nasheed calculates her age to be roughly around eighty-five.

He’s still muttering about Hassan Fareed when he runs into another woman of about the same age. She, too, is lingering on a side street on the off-chance of running into Nasheed.

Before we get to the jetty, we meet a third woman in the same age group, waiting in a lane-way, alone.

“She has a tough time, that Dhaththa [older sister, generic term used for older women],” an MDP councillor explained. Her children do not want her supporting Nasheed.

Intimidation by children who do not want their elderly parents to support MDP or vote for Nasheed is a trend common to several of the islands. The women I talked to in Hanimaadhoo recounted several such stories, as did the ones in Filladhoo.

Some grown-up children, I learn, also confiscate their parents’ ID cards and bank cards, keeping the parent a virtual prisoner both politically and financially.

Baarah

The island of Baarah is shaped like a C, with the jetty right at the centre. On both sides is turquoise blue sea and a long white strip of beach lined with tall coconut palms and other large tropical trees. It is the island where national hero Boduthakurufaanu met his wife, and the island of Ramlah, the winner of the first Maldivian beauty pageant held back in the glory days of Mohamed Amin Didi.

Lunch is at a small restaurant attached to a house which opened its doors for MDP on Baarah. There is the usual splendid array of Maldivian food—rihaakuru garudhiya, bambukeyo lee baiy,lonu mirus, even kan’doo from the kulhi with fresh grated coconut and grilled reef fish.

Over a dozen women move in and out of the restaurant area. Like on other islands, they have pooled their efforts to cook up the feast.

The men of Baarah are also surprisingly hands-on in serving food and overseeing lunch. We meet a most interesting man as we linger over the meal. Moosa Bey (Moosa Ibrahim) is a 75-year-old man who bursts into loud uncontrollable tears suddenly and without warning.

“I have a very big and very soft heart,” he tells us before beginning to cry loudly. It takes a few of us media people a good half hour of trying to console Moosa Bey to realise what the whole island already knows: Moosa Bey likes to act.

Still, he is a very likeable man, and we visit his house to meet his wife Faathuma. En route, he flirts with the twenty-something year old volunteer who joined us from Kulhudhuffushi. He wants his picture taken with her.

Moosa Bey proudly claims that his house, almost complete now, is being built with the MVR 2000 (US$129) benefit for the elderly that he and his wife receives from the government every month. Moosa Bey’s house is modest, and there is no furniture just yet.

Walking around, I notice people here are even more polarised than on all the other islands we have been to. Non-MDP supporters are openly hostile, even to us ‘media people’ walking around with neither Nasheed nor any member of the MDP campaign team anywhere in sight. They refuse to smile or greet us, choosing instead to look on glumly, staring daggers.

It is sad to see traditional Maldivian hospitality vanishing in the strong emotions of partisan politics. I meet a twenty-something year old woman who is not an MDP supporter but is willing to talk. Only because she has a friend among the media.

I learn that on Baarah the PPM and/or ‘opposition coalition’ supporters are more forceful in intimidating MDP supporters than the men I heard about on other islands. “MDP members hired a woman’s Bodu Beru group to welcome Nasheed.

The group is composed mostly of members of DRP and supporters of Gayoom. The women were willing to play for money, though, Nasheed or not. But the men intimidated them into pulling out at the last minute. “They were going around making all kinds of threats,” she tells me.

It is around 4:00 p.m now and the trip is coming to an end. Nasheed leaves for Male’ at 7:30 pm and we need to be in Hanimaadhoo airport by 5:00. At the jetty, a fishing boat has docked. Women gather to buy the catch. One by one, they come back with varying amounts of fresh fish which they will cook at nightfall.

Nasheed will leave for Noonu Atoll tomorrow.

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations

For more photos of the trip, visit Dhivehi Sitee Facebook Page

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Comment: It’s the judiciary, stupid

This article was first published on Dhivehi Sitee. Republished with permission.

We had information that on 8 February Mohamed Nasheed would close other courts in the Maldives, send all judges home, and acting on his own, would establish a Judicial Reform Commission. From then onwards, it would be this Commission that would appoint all magistrates. ~2013 Presidential Candidate, Umar Naseer (PPM).

I learned about President Nasheed’s intention to establish a Judicial Reform Commission—or in whatever name it maybe—only after the government changed.

– 2013 Presidential Candidate, Abdulla Yameen (PPM)

We don’t know for sure whether Mohamed Nasheed was planning to form a Judicial Reform Commission on 8 February 2012 or not. But, leaders of the National Alliance, especially PPM, have made it clear what motivated them most to be out on the streets protesting until Nasheed’s government ended was the prospect of Nasheed making changes to the judiciary.

Many ‘intelligence-based’ reasons were offered for the National Alliance’s opposition to the expected changes: Nasheed’s Judicial Reform Commission was going to be totally under his control; it was a way for Nasheed to usurp judicial power; it was Nasheed’s means of destroying the judiciary.

Truth of the matter is all parties in the National Alliance would have been opposed to judicial reform in whatever form it came.

To regard all attempts at reforming the judiciary as undue interference is to believe that the existing judiciary is as should be—independent, just, equal. This is far from the truth. To begin with, an overwhelming majority of current judges were sworn in extra-constitutionally, in violation of Article 285 which demands new, higher, ethical and professional standards from judges. As former Judicial Service Commission (JSC) member Aishath Velezinee exposed, the Commission colluded with authoritarian loyalists to dismiss Article 285 as ‘symbolic’.

Ignoring the constitutional requirement for a complete overhaul of the judiciary has allowed unqualified, unethical and downright criminal individuals to remain on the benches long past the constitutional deadline. Neither the Executive nor the Majlis took appropriate action to stop the oath-taking then; nor have they taken any steps to remedy the situation since. Many of these judges — spread out across low, higher and highest courts — were appointed by, and continue to be under the influence of, pre-democracy leaders. Chief Judge of the Criminal Court Abdulla Mohamed (Ablow Ghaazee) is the icing on the authoritarians’ unhealthily large share of the judicial cake.

His removal and any other change in the carefully engineered set-up would mean less protection for those facing serious torture and fraud charges dating back to the dictatorship. The PPM-led National Alliance protests, seen this way, can be described as intended to ‘protect the judiciary’ from reform rather than keeping interference at bay.

It is now over a year since the National Alliance’s protests saw out the end of the country’s first democratically elected government. If judicial independence is what the protests were about, tackling the problems head-on would have been the new government’s first priority. On the contrary, every effort has been made to sustain the status-quo which preceded Nasheed’s drastic decision to have Abdulla Mohamed arrested.

“I thought he [Abdulla Mohamed] should be released, but I don’t think he should be allowed on the bench until all investigations pending against him have been satisfactorily investigated,” Dr Waheed, the current president said in his CoNI testimony.

Yet, Abdulla Mohamed is not just on the bench, he is back as Chief Judge of the Criminal Court, the main man sitting over the trial of Nasheed for his arrest. Indeed, reinstating Ablow Ghaazee was the first order of business for the new regime. Presidential Candidate Gasim Ibrahim (JP) [who, ‘incidentally’, is also a member of the JSC], meanwhile, dismissed UNSR Gabriella Knaul’s recommendations for judicial reform as lies and levity.

The government’s reaction to all such recommendations has been to either ramp up nationalistic rhetoric and play the sovereignty card, willfully ignore the expert advice, or both.

As noted in the UNSR report, ‘all branches of the State and all institutions have a role to play and responsibilities regarding the consolidation of democracy.’ But, sadly for the Maldives, it is not just the executive failing in its responsibilities towards judicial independence, but the Majlis, too, seems unable (or unwilling) to appreciate the absolute indispensability of judicial independence for regaining democracy.

MPs like Mahloof and Nihan of PPM who so ‘valiantly’ fought on the streets of Male’ to ‘protect the judiciary’, for instance, have yet to raise any judicial reform issues in parliament. Apart from a few individual MPs advocating for reform on other platforms, the Majlis as a collective body has been actively negligent of its duties towards the judiciary.

Otherwise, by now, it would have held the entire JSC accountable for dismissing Article 285 of the Constitution as symbolic. MDP MPs, and others, should have pushed not just for the removal of Gasim Ibrahim from the Commission, but every member of the JSC that colluded in the decision to violate the Constitution.

Long before Majlis summoned Speaker Abdulla Shahid to ask about the Hulhumale’ magistrate court, it should have asked him to explain what he saw, witnessed and participated in while in the JSC that allowed Article 285 to be deemed irrelevant. Even when the Parliamentary Oversight Committee had Shahid in front of them last Tuesday, not only did it fail to ask him about his role in the dismissal of Artical 285, it also failed to interrogate him on how the Hulhumale’ Court bench was illegitimately appointed by the JSC on his watch. “I was not present at the meeting,” is not a reason for absolving any JSC member, Speaker of Parliament or not, from responsibility.

The constant failure by the Majlis to hold JSC accountable for its crimes against judicial independence suggests: a) it is incompetent; and/or b) it colluded with the JSC in violating Article 285 of the Constitution.

All MPs, no matter what party affiliation, must collectively exercise the right and responsibility of the Majlis to hold the JSC accountable, and to work towards redressing Article 285, and all that needs done to ensure we have the kind of judiciary envisaged by the 2008 Constitution on which the Maldivian democracy is based.

Without judicial reform, it is hard to see how the upcoming elections could be free and fair nor how life after elections could be democratic.

Dr Azra Naseem has a PhD in international relations

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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