Gasim’s company requests delay to $100m fine

Politician Gasim Ibrahim’s Villa Group has asked to delay payment of a $100million payment for fines and rent levied by the government on a series of island and lagoon leases, Haveeru reports.

The government has been seeking to end agreements with Villa over the leases, and said in February the group of companies owed them USD 100 million (MVR 1.5 billion) to be paid within 30 days.

Villa has also requested a suspension of the Tourism Ministry’s order to terminate the lease agreements, and has filed ten lawsuits over the termination of deals related to six uninhabited islands.

The civil court had earlier granted a hold on the termination notices, but this was rescinded after an appeal.

Villa last week said that it still had four years left to develop the islands under the original contracts, and therefore it  did not believe it should have to pay the fines before that time.

The fine was levied after Gasim and his Jumhooree Party left the ruling coalition and allied with the opposition Maldivian Democratic Party, taking part in a series of protests which began on February 10th.

“Even though Gasim has not been put behind prison bars, the government has economically paralysed him,” Ameen Ibrahim, deputy leader of the Jumhooree Party, said earlier this month.

Speaking at the same press conference, Adhaalath Party president Sheikh Imran Abdulla accused the government of planning to seize all of Gasim’s assets and making sure he was “unable to move his hands or legs” in his defence.