The State Trading Organisation (STO) will lift price controls on potatoes, onions and eggs, as well as rationing the commodities on a per-head basis.
“We’re trying to lift the control tomorrow as we received a new shipment of the goods last night which is being cleared from customs,” Managing Director Shahid Ali told Haveeru.
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(0)Religious scholars of different political allegiances have moved to refute and condemn NGO Jammiyathul Salaf’s claim earlier this week that taxation is haram (forbidden) in Islam.
Deputy Islamic Minister Sheikh Mohamed Farooq told local media that there was no religious grounds to declare taxation prohibited.
“When you say something is forbidden in religion, it should be clear under what principle or rationale that it is forbidden,” he explained to newspaper Haveeru. “You can’t just declare something forbidden on a whim. You cannot say something is forbidden when it is not clearly and definitely forbidden.”
He added that Zakat (alms for the poor) were being collected as before and old forms of taxation, such as varuvaa and import duties were not prohibited in Islam either.
Sheikh Farooq condemned the issuance of such fatwas (religious edicts) “without considering” either its validity or social impact.
Meanwhile the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party’s (MDP) religious council condemned Salaf’s claims as an attempt to mislead the public over taxation.
“Human beings cannot forbid something Allah has allowed or allow something Allah has forbidden,” the council’s chair al-Hafiz Ahmed Zaki told the party’s website.
Hafiz Zaki explained that Islam specified steps to be followed before religious judgments or rulings could be made: “One cannot just arbitrarily declare something forbidden,” he said.
Zaki warned that such fatwas could lead to civil unrest and social divisions over religious issues. He said that Islam was a religion of moderation that did not encourage extreme actions.
Zaki urged the public and businessmen to clear any doubts with the concerned authorities instead of “listening to press releases issued by individuals soaked in self-interest.”
Meanwhile Adhaalath party spokesperson Sheikh Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed told Miadhu newspaper that taxation was practiced in many Islamic countries while there was consensus among scholars that it was not prohibited.
“There are narrations that have reached us that tax was taken by the state during the time of Caliph Umar. He collected tax from wealth,” he said.
Opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) MP Afrashim Ali, chair of the party’s religious council, meanwhile told private broadcaster DhiFM that there was no grounds to declare taxation forbidden in Islam.
However NGO Salaf insisted in its press release Monday that, “Without doubt, using a person’s property or profiting from the property without the consent of the owner is haram in Islam. Only the compulsory Zakat (alms for the poor) portion can be taxed from a Muslim’s property.”
The religious NGO contended that “formulating a law and taking people’s property whatever name it is done under is for a certainty haram.”
“Jamiyyathul Salaf would remind the Speaker of Parliament and all MPs that those who formulate such laws and those who assist them will without a doubt have to bear responsibility before Almighty Allah,” the Salaf statement warned.
It adds that there is consensus in the Islamic ummah (community) that “stealing property by compulsion with laws on taxes, duties and pension imposed on a Muslim’s property is definitely haram.”
(0)Dislikes(0)A programme to reintegrate convicts to be released from Maafushi prison back into society began with 200 inmates today.
In his address to the nation on Independence Day, President Mohamed Nasheed announced that close to 400 convicts would be offered “a second chance,” given government jobs and gradually reintegrated into society.
MNBC One reports that the first round of the reintegration programme began this morning with 200 inmates chosen for release.
Over 80 percent of inmates in Maafushi jail were incarcerated for drug-related offences.
(0)Dislikes(0)The rapid spread of dengue in Gaaf Alif Villigili last week that resulted in one death and 129 islanders struck with fever has been brought under control, according to the island hospital.
MNBC One reports that the ‘Villigili Dengue Task Force’ conducted a door-to-door awareness raising programme together with programmes to clean the island and spray fog to eradicate mosquito breeding grounds after three people were admitted to hospital on Saturday with dengue fever.
No new cases have been reported to the hospital in the past three days. Four people – three expatriates and a four year-old girl – are being treated at the hospital for dengue.
Nationwide some 1,900 cases of dengue have been recorded so far this year with 11 deaths compared to a total of 10 in 2006 out of 2,788 recorded cases.
(0)Dislikes(0)The Male’ International Airport was renamed ‘Ibrahim Nasir International Airport’ on Independence Day, July 26 in honour of the former President who secured independence from the British.
The airport at Hulhule’ was built through a communal effort led by Nasir, who is widely credited with modernising the country and launching the tourism industry.
Under Nasir, Maldives became the first small state to join the United Nations at a time when the country’s population was below 80,000.
Nasir also introduced English-medium curriculum in schools, introduced radio and television broadcasting and mechanised fishing vessels.
(0)Dislikes(0)The Environment Protection Agency (EPA) will seek legal advice from the Attorney General over fining the State Electricity Company (STELCO) for environmental damages.
On March 30 an STELCO oil pipe buried under Male’s ring road Boduthakurufaanumagu burst, leaking large quantities of oil into the track swimming area, frequented by school children and the public.
Following the accident with the oil pipe, the EPA discovered 4.4ml of oil in the swimming area in its thrice-weekly inspections.
EPA Director Ibrahim Naeem told MNBC One that the agency has decided to fine STELCO as the company was responsible for the damage. However he did not reveal the amount of fines to be levied.
In February this year, the EPA fined STELCO Rf400,000 (US$25,900) after large quantities of oil kept in barrels in the Gaakoshi plot in Male’ seeped into the ground.
(0)Dislikes(0)Staff at the former Television Maldives (TVM) and Voice of Maldives (VoM) – now the Maldives National Broadcasting Corporation (MNBC) – cannot work with the parliament-approved board of the Maldives Broadcasting Company (MBC), Independent MP and former Information Minister Mohamed Nasheed has said.
Responding to a question by a journalist at a forum organised by the Maldives Media Council (MMC) Monday night, Nasheed explained that the MBC Act was intended to transform the corporatised state media into a public broadcaster but the board voted through by opposition MPs was engaged in “political football.”
“Everything went right, but because of those who were chosen for the director’s board, the whole thing turned into political football,” MP Nasheed said, according to Sun Online.
(0)Dislikes(0)Police arrested two muggers who robbed an expatriate at knife point in Hulhumale’ last night.
The mugging took place near the Ghazi School around 7:35pm and the two suspects were taken into custody shortly afterward by a police patrol.
One of the muggers threw away the phone and cash stolen from the expatriate when he saw the police patrol while the other threw away the knife. However both men – Ibrahim Ahzam, 29, M. Suthulimaage, and Mohamed Maaheen Ahmed, 22, Seenu Feydhoo Chandaneemaage – were taken into custody with the stolen items and the weapon.
The expatriate victim was unharmed in the incident. Hulhumale’ police station and the police property and commercial crime department are investigating the case.
(0)Dislikes(0)President Mohamed Nasheed opened the new Male’ City Council office or Male’ City Hall at Galolhu Billoorijehige (old national library site) yesterday.
Speaking at the opening ceremony, the President noted that more than one-third of development projects were focused on Male’ as one-third of the country’s population was concentrated in the capital.
President Nasheed suggested that the capital could be expanded to encompass the islands from Kaafu Atoll Kudafaru near Hulhumale’ to Giraavaru.
Mayor ‘Maizan’ Ali Manik meanwhile said that the tasks of the council has been divided into eight areas and a councillor has been chosen to oversee each municipal service.
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