Health officials on the island of Maakurath in Raa Atoll have confirmed the death of a two-year-old boy whose body was discovered in a lagoon this morning, according to press reports.
Haveeru reported that the boy had no pulse by the time he arrived at the island’s health centre and had an undisclosed foam coming from his mouth and nose.
The young boy was believed to have been discovered by his mother.
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(0)Police have found a Bangladeshi man tied upside down inside a Hulhumale’ home, newspaper Haveeru has reported.
Haveeru reported that the man was beaten up badly when he was discovered by police, who have since arrested nine expats in connection with the case.
The report claimed that the man was unconscious upon arriving at hospital and was suspected of having been held in the house for several days.
(0)Dislikes(0)A court in Addu Atoll has extended the detention of four persons arrested for alleged involvement in illegal prostitution.
Three of the four suspects were arrested inside a salon named ‘Talk More’ that is based in Addu, while they were allegedly engaged in sexual activity.
Local media reported that the fourth suspect to be arrested in connection with the case was the owner of the salon.
(0)Dislikes(0)Police have confirmed they are investigating allegations that a man currently being held in custody had sexually abused underage female relatives from his wife’s side of their family.
A police spokesperson told Minivan News that a man had been arrested after police received reports that he had sexually abused minors, whom local media claim are nieces of his wife that were under 16 years of age at the time that the abuse was alleged to have taken place.
According to newspaper Haveeru, the suspect, said to be living in Male’, had been handed over to police by family members for allegedly sexual abusing three nieces and his sister-in-law. The report claimed the suspect was attacked by family members on a boat in Male’, where he works as a captain, before being taken to police.
An unnamed relative of the family involved in the investigation reportedly told the family that the allegations related to a number of incidents thought to have occurred over years.
The police spokesperson was unable to reveal any additional regarding the alleged victims or if police would be relying on any forensic evidence or witnesses as part of their investigations.
“At present investigations are continuing and this is the only information we can release right now,” he said. “More details will be announced at a later date.”
The suspect at present remains in police custody, police added.
(0)Dislikes(0)Deputy Secretary General of the Commonwealth Mmasekgoa Masire-Mwamba is visiting the Maldives for a workshop to be held on government and opposition cooperation.
The regional Commonwealth workshop on ‘Government and the Opposition – Roles, Rights and Responsibilities’ will be held in the capital Malé from June 13-15.
Masire-Mwamba visited President Mohamed Nasheed who discussed the progress the country was making towards consolidating democracy, and said that his government is open to advice and suggestions about how this could be enhanced.
Masire-Mwamba also visited Foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem, who said the Commonwealth could help to raise greater awareness of the challenges faced by small island developing states, and their particular vulnerability to global economic and environmental pressures.
Masire-Mwamba also held talks with the Speaker of the People’s Majlis, Abdulla Shahid, who is hosting the regional workshop, and said it would provide a platform for the cross-fertilisation of ideas and the exchange of experiences across the Asian members of the Commonwealth. In her meeting with the opposition leader, Ahmed Thasmeen Ali, Masire-Mwamba discussed the consolidation of political and democratic reforms in Maldives, and the role that an effective Opposition can play in a robust democracy.
(0)Dislikes(0)The Criminal Court today granted the Prosecutor General (PG) permission to hold Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) MP Hassan Adil in detention until his trial reaches conclusion.
The court has said that permission was granted upon a request made by the PG’s office today during the first hearing of the trial.
Police have alleged that Adil sexually abused a 13 year-old girl belonging to a family with whom he was close friends.
The Criminal Court said the court warrant to hold Adil under detention until the trial end was issued according to article 28 of Child Sex Offenders Special Provisions Act.
The Criminal Court issued a warrant for the arrest of Adil in April. His detention was subsequently extended, and then later reduced to house arrest.
Police concluded the investigation of Adil in May and forwarded the case to the PG.
As the trial concerns to a child, the Criminal Court has decided to conduct the trial closed to the public and journalists.
Article 73[c]2 of the constitution states that a member of the parliament will be disqualified if found guilty of a criminal offence that involves a prison sentence of more than twelve months.
Adil was formerly a member of the Dhivehi Qaumee Party (DQP) prior to joining the MDP last year.
(0)Dislikes(0)There are so many things wrong with our democracy. A dysfunctional judiciary, stunted and already disintegrating party system, politicised and unprofessional media, polarized society, growing intolerance, xenophobia and the list goes on. But whatever the affliction is, the one underlying factor is always corruption. We know, corruption is an old song sung by all politicians everywhere. But this time around, we are not talking about the corruption of the old, the established and the already corrupt, but about the corruption of a fairly young generation of politicians who will possibly remain in Maldivian politics for another 30-40 years. We are talking about the corruption of a generation of politicians who could have been defined otherwise.
What went wrong?
The Maldives is celebrated as a model for peaceful transition to democracy. The opening up of the political system that began in 2003 led to free and fair elections fairly quickly. The old autocrat was not arrested and thrown into jail as happens in so many other countries, but instead given a hefty pension package and left to himself for the most part. Three branches of the state were made separate and independent, and the fourth estate was given its due freedom. What went wrong?
What went wrong is strikingly similar to what goes wrong in so many African democracies. The liberator who wrenches his people from the clutches of exploitative colonial powers is hailed in as the good leader, and then the people are forever stuck with him. And he is good, at least in the prologue. He must have believed in freedom, in people’s right to make their own destinies and to live a good life, to have fought so long and hard and put his neck on the line. For his bravery and courage, he is rewarded with legitimacy, people’s love and admiration. And he is handed the ultimate prize (via a free and fair election, of course)- the chance to become the president of the first real democracy in that country. But somewhere along the line, the leader miscalculates how far he can push his legitimacy and thinks himself above the law. In order to ‘save his people’, he convinces himself that he has to do whatever it takes, and sometimes the whatever part involves ugly nasty immoral things like corruption, bribery and appeasing big businesses at the cost of the public good.
Let’s not forget the party machinery that often ushers in these liberator-type leaders. What eventually ends up becoming a political party often starts out as a movement, a movement for freedom, liberation and democracy. The sole purpose of the movement-cum-political party is to free the people. And as such, upon independence or at the end of dictatorship, the party becomes a mere vehicle for the liberator-leader to ride in to take his rightful place as the head of the new democracy. Sadly, the party ceases to become anything more. Tangled in the politics of the day, the party fails to mature. It lacks a clearly articulated ideology, a set of values or anything for that matter that can define it independently of its liberation history. And just for the record, no, five key pledges does not amount to an ideology. People cannot be expected to analyse the party manifesto and derive the party’s philosophy on their own, if it exists at all. And no, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom’s personality does not amount to an ideology either.
What is so wrong now?
The problem is, not only does the party continue to be the liberator’s vehicle to remain in power but it begins to destroy all other parties around it, sometimes by guns and outright violence, but in our case with ‘secret’ deals that are not only accepted, but boasted about in political circles and laughed over at cocktail parties. “Hey, I paid Mrf 5 million and a BMW for that guy over there” wink. “Oh really, well I paid about Mrf 15 million for this guy right here. Prices keep rising by the day…we better buy up all available on the market before prices go through the roof! Hohoho!” And so, riding high on liberation victory, the leader and his party come to practice a vile sort of politics. A politics of “only we can be trusted with power” and “damn those slow and tedious democratic process.” In short, the politics of arrogance.
Of course, the liberator and his party machinery try to justify this politics of arrogance. They say that if they do not deliver and make good on their key pledges, then not only may they lose elections come 2013, but that, lo and behold, they will surely lose it to the old dictator or his brother! Not only that, if the MDP fails to deliver, ‘the people’ will cease to believe in the promise of democracy! And God forbid, we cannot let these things happen, not after all the blood and tears, not after trying so damn hard to go by that complicated and cumbersome constitution.
Therefore, in its mad frenzy to get everything done before the clock strikes 12 o’clock in 2013, the MDP government, instead of putting up a steady honest fight, is buying the entire game and in the process, relying less and less on democratic processes. We need not look beyond parliament for evidence. Let us be clear, the MDP is not outwardly undemocratic. Besides the occasional slip of the tongue, it sticks to its narrative of democratic governance at the podiums. But away from the cameras and the public’s eye, the party and most Maldivian politicians engage in what can be termed as real deal-making. And this real deal-making almost always subverts democratic processes. Surely, this has to be informal politics at its best.
And again, just for the record, given the blatant political prostitution in parliament, even if the government builds an apartment for every Maldivian (doesn’t matter if they can afford it), a hospital (too expensive to maintain) on every island, establishes a fast ferry between all islands and makes every youth drug-free (but perhaps jobless), that does not prove that democracy worked. It merely proves that the MDP party machinery and its tactics worked. And these are two very different claims that have far-reaching consequences.
Why is it wrong?
The bitter result of the politics of arrogance and the corruption and bribery it necessitates is that it is imbibing a new generation of politicians with the view that politics is ultimately about being in power. That without absolute power, you cannot get anything done. That power is the be-all and end-all of politics. In doing so, they have changed the narrative of the land from “what is good?” to “what is the lesser evil?” And that is a damn shame. For if there was a reason I voted, it was because I trusted my elected official to make wise decisions that would contribute to me living well, and at the same time contribute to the greater good of the society. And I also trusted that official to not always see the greater good in monetary terms. And I also trusted that official not to cast the building of a harbor, an airport or a housing project as incompatible with sticking to democratic processes.
So the story goes that, the politics of arrogance not only deprives a nation of honest and virtuous politicians, but also buries the common good and on its tomb, plants the seeds of political power and waters it with the greed and lust of an emerging generation of crass politicians who are morally stunted and politically shackled for years to come.
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(0)Dislikes(0)The Maldives Media Council (MMC) has accused the President’s Office of discouraging journalists from following the council’s rulings and code of conduct.
The MMC’s claims came after Press Secretary for the President’s Office Mohamed Zuhair told news outlet Sun Online that the government did not support any action against journalists of the Sun Media Group, after three journalists conducted an investigation into illegal prostitution in the Maldives.
The Media Council declared the standard of the written articles were unprofessional and that the articles indicated that the journalists may have been engaged in sexual activities with the prostitutes, and that their style of writing encouraged the activity. It referred the matter to the Prosecutor General.
However, Zuhair told the paper that the government did not consider the articles to be inappropriate, or containing words that indicated that the journalists might have involved themselves in any criminal offences.
In a press release issued by the MMC following the remarks made by the Press Secretary, the MMC accused the President’s Office of obstructing the council’s efforts to establish a culture in which journalists worked within a code of conduct.
The council said the executive was speaking in such a way that implied it could influence the work of the council, which was irresponsible.
‘’It makes the public and the media lose confidence in the legal duty of the council to set the media in the right direction,’’ said the Media Council in the statement. ‘’The remarks made by the Press Secretary were made in a way that it encouraged such writings, and was said without showing any respect to the Islamic principles, laws and the beliefs of an Islamic society.’’
The council also noted that it has declared that the articles were inconsistent with the Media Code of Ethics and that the editorial management of Sun had already apologised over it.
After Sun Magazine published series of articles sharing their experience with prostitutes working at spas and salons in Male’, the MMC pulled the magazines from circulation and forwarded the case to the Prosecutor General to file criminal charges against the paper.
Press Secretary for the President Mohamed Zuhair was not responding at time of press.
(0)Dislikes(0)The first phase of the Gulhifalhu development project – including land reclamation and revetment – cost US$15 million, the company behind it has said.
Global Projects Development (GPD) held a ceremony and tree-planting ceremony on June 11 to present 37 deeds to people who had rented plots of land on the new island, which targeted warehouse development.
Haveeru reported CEO and Managing Director of GPD Sivarajah Manivannan as saying that the total cost of the project was expected to reach US$25 million.
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