President Dr Mohamed Waheed has officially filed his candidacy with the Maldives Election Commission (EC) to stand in the upcoming presidential election.
President Waheed was joined by his running mate, Dhivehi Rayithunge Party (DRP) MP Ahmed Thasmeen Ali, as he submitted his candidacy forms to EC President Fuad Thaufeeq ahead of voting scheduled for September 7, his campaign team confirmed.
EC Vice President Ahmed Fayaz confirmed to Minivan News that the commission was now verifying the 2,000 signatures submitted by President Waheed backing his candidacy, before making a final decision on any approval.
“We would have announced his acceptance today, but he submitted 2,000 names that we will need to check,” he said.
Fayaz said it was possible the EC would make an official announcement concerning President’s Waheed candidacy tomorrow (July 22), once the signatures were verified.
Amidst the possibility of his Gaumee Ithihaad Party (GIP) facing dissolution for not having the 10,000 members required to officially register a political entity in the Maldives, President Waheed on Tuesday (July 16) announced his intention to stand for election as an independent candidate.
On Friday, President Waheed’s ‘Forward with the nation’ coalition announced he had obtained the 1,500 signatures required to register himself as an independent candidate.
Despite the recent defections of the government-aligned religious conservative Adhaalath Party (AP) and later the Dhivehi Qaumee Party (DQP) from his coalition, the DRP said Friday that the incumbent’s campaign was “going to plan”.
According to Sun Online, the EC will decide on all candidacies within 48 hours of their paperwork being submitted.
Meanwhile, former President Nasheed filed his own candidacy papers with the EC on Thursday (July 18). His candidacy was approved later the same day, according to the EC.
Nasheed and the MDP maintain he was compelled to resign during a police and military mutiny on February 7, 2012. His successor and former vice-president, Dr Mohamed Waheed, maintain the succession was legitimate.
Fraudulent party enlistment allegations
Investigations are meanwhile underway into 46 cases of fraudulent political party enlistment filed by the EC, as well as another case individually lodged.
The fraudulent political party forms are said to include 15 signed to President Waheed’s GIP, five from his DRP running mate Thasmeen, and 27 from prominent businessman and MP Ahmed Siyam’s Maldives Democratic Alliance (MDA).
Some of the people signed up to the parties were alleged to already be deceased at the time of their registration.
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Watch out for his exit plans. All those million dollar transactions are not a coincidence. I bet he's already booked his exit flight and will leave the door even before the election results are announced.
The transfer of funds seen in GCHQ intelligence reports to Norway should send alarm bells ringing. Remember that Norway was chosen carefully. It's not an EU member state and that has significant ramifications.
The biggest problem in developing counties is corruption. Corruptions starts within the apparatus of government, the bigger the government is, the malignancy get worse as the public funds circulate freely in the hands of those who get opportunity to meddle with easy money.
Anni’s policy of smaller government, to make policies only, was the starting point to eradicate the corruption. When Government is reduced to policy making body, there will be less chances of corruption in public funds. The second phase of his privatization was import to reduce the government roll in running the utilities and maintaining infrastructure. During such revolution in transformation of new government after 30 years of corruption, mismanagement and lack of capable partners to overtake the responsibilities, it was obvious that it was not an easy task and there was always possibilities of opportunist to get in to loop holes and pilferage as much as possible, but it was the only way to begin with forming a democratic government. It was also necessary to consolidate enough power to revolutionize the whole system, for that you need to create lot of political post to get political support to bring such changes. Those who were against such development knew where he was heading and it was not tolerable for them with fear of losing the grip on public funds and losing the grip on the economy as well on individual rights. This is where the formation of coup started and the same bandit are fighting against what Maldives should be heading. So it should be Anni again if you need the change required for democracy, freedom, rule of law to prevail.
The biggest problem we have is our stupidity. Our own ignorance.
Why should we believe what the Arabian warthogs say? Why should we enforce the Bedouin culture and force feed to our kids?
How do you become an independent candidate when you are a member of a political party? I refer to both Dr Waheed and Thasmeen. Have they both left their respective parties?
@Fishy Head on Mon, 22nd Jul 2013 10:06 AM
"Anni’s policy of smaller government, to make policies only, was the starting point to eradicate the corruption. "
I beg to differ, Mr. Head. I agree with the principle of smaller governments, but if Anni had such a policy, he certainly never implemented one.
If you are talking about the dozens of utility "companies" and cooperatives, then we can certainly say they were the biggest waste of state funds and led to new levels of corruption all over the country.
Having a single utility company run by the government is bad enough, but dozens of them all over the place, manned by hundreds of political appointees is not an example of creating "smaller governments". To my mind, it was as if Communism was Nasheed's new policy. Where else do you see the State owning and running hundreds of enterprises?
Can you give us a single example of an efficient, well run and uncorrupt utility or cooperative that the last government created?