The Maldivian people should “bow in shame” following President Mohamed Nasheed’s dancing at a Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) rally on Thursday, the religiously conservative Adhaalath Party has claimed.
In a video of the incident, President Nasheed is seen dancing with a group of senior party officials while MDP Parliamentary Group Leader ‘Reeko’ Moosa Manik sings on stage at Thoddu in North Ari Atoll.
‘’This is not the behaviour we expect to see from the people who are supposed to set an example for Maldivians,’’ said the Adhaalath Party, in a statement. ‘’Their behaviour was uncivilised and irresponsible.’’
The party said it was a national shame that the President had participated in a rally where ‘’males and females danced together like in a disco with a DJ.’’
‘’Heads of nations are supposed set an example for their people. They are obliged to live a very honorable life,’’ said the party. ‘’We don’t see presidents of non-Muslim states dancing and performing circus acts in public.’’
“By all accounts [Reeko Moosa’s] singing was pretty awful,” acknowledged a senior government source.
“The Adhaalath Party has new leadership and this may be them trying to flex some muscle and show they are independent,” the source suggested, adding that Nasheed had emphasised the 800 year durability of Islam in the Maldives while handing out certificates to the winners of a Quran recitation competition this morning.
In its statement, the Adhaalath Party further alleged that the MDP had used government vessels to ferry “hundreds of MDP supporters” to Thoddu, which, it claimed, “shows how much this government is addicted to corruption.”
The political system of the Maldives was moving towards a dictatorship and what the people saw on Thursday night was “the real image of MDP,” the Adhaalath Party stated.
The MDP has had an increasingly conflicted relationship with the Adhaalath Party: its remaining coalition partner and the third largest party in the country. The party’s ranks make up much of the Ministry of Islamic Affairs.
In February 2010, the government capitulated to the Adhaalath Party’s demands that new regulations licensing the sale of alcohol to non-Maldivians in hotel of over 100 beds on inhabited islands be scrapped, after thousands of people protested in the capital.
Individual liquor licensing, which had been repealed in the lead up to the new regulation, was not reinstated, leading to a flourishing blackmarket around the illegal commodity.
Further clashes between the coalition partners took place in December 2010 over the visit of a group of Israeli eye surgeons from the NGO ‘Eyes from Zion’, resulting in protests in Republic Square, the burning of the Israeli flag, and statements that those Maldivians who accepted the free surgery were at risk of having their organs harvested.
More recently, the Adhaalath Party has threatened to split from the MDP if the government allows Israeli airline El Al to operate in the Maldives. The government has responded that flights will begin on December 13.
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