Tag: maldives

Comment: Decades of corruption and tyranny leave Maldivians narcissistic and power hungry

Over the years I have closely observed an acute realism in the thinking of many of the Maldivians I have come across.

Such realism is a natural response to all of the corruption and tyranny that has been perpetrated by those who are supposed to be grand and noble.

This realism often leads to a profound suspicion about the motives of others. At times, it takes on an Islamic face. In a sigh of despair many proclaim, nothing can be done, it is Allah’s Will.

An observed manifestation of this acute realism in some is extreme narcissistic power hunger and personal corruption. Many reason, well, there is no way to escape corruption, if I am not corrupt I will get done over by the corrupt guy.

Despite this realism, leaders are still worshipped by some Maldivians although everyone knows the rhetoric and the cult nature of Maldivian political life is based on a whole lot of lies.

Leaders with absolute power get high on the power trip of being worshipped, no doubt knowing that it is only out of fear and selfish ambition that the people are worshipping them. To save one’s skin, or to promote one’s own self, one worships the leader publically.

So taking all this into account, the question arises… Why should one pursue justice when one is intelligent enough to know that we human beings are all corrupt and can never be anything but?

Human nature is selfish, self-deceptive and prone to corruption. Justice and goodness are defined by the powerful, surely there is no such thing as a real right and wrong, there is only ‘will to power…’

This was posed by Thrasymachus to Socrates in Plato’s Republic, and has been debated ever since.

There is a reward for pursuing truth, compassion and justice, not in a conventional economic sense, and not in a this worldly sense. The seekers of good in this life are normally tortured, rejected, and suffer for it.

The evidence that there is a reward comes from those who have suffered and/or died struggling for truth, compassion and justice when they knew they would never see it. The death and suffering of all the martyr’s for love and justice in human history proves that what they have, what they feel, is something much, something far deeper than what can be realized in this life. It is evidence that they have something, know something that is worth dying for.

This something is a hope rooted in an experience of a reality deeper than death. It is a profound sense of the sanctity of humanity which cannot possibly or logically come from this world.

It is awakened through both pain and love. It is the reality which this word justice is founded on.

Yes, justice is real, and it is not relative or subjective. It is the reward and punishment due for ones level of respect for the sanctity of humanity.

The need for justice is innate, and it is the greatest proof of the existence of a Supreme Being there is. Justice is frustrated in this world, and yet we still desire it and believe in it though we know we can never get it on this earth. The fact that this need for justice we have survives even though it is obvious that we will never get justice on this earth proves that this need must come from a source deeper and more powerful than what we can see in this world.

There is an inbuilt, a subconscious homesickness in each one of us for a home we do not know, for perfection and a humanity we have never experienced. This a-priori longing for the unknown is evidence that something outside of that which we perceive has reached down to us and put in our hearts a hunger for that which is existant only in the afterlife. It is the sense of the Divine which is the knowing of the unknown.

Where else would this persistant hunger for justice and perfection come from seems we cannot possibly get it from this world? What would motivate us to struggle for the sanctity of humanity knowing that on this Earth we will never realize it, if the knowledge of this perfection were not somehow built into our unconscious minds as the way the Divine makes us long for the Divine?

Do we crave for a food we have never tasted? So why do we crave for justice when we have never tasted that? Our taste for justice could not possibly have come from this earth, so where does this taste for justice come from if it is not somehow innate, an inbuilt sense of hope which whilst obviously not derived from this earth must only come from beyond it.

It does not help to deny the existence of the Creator in the name of Justice as so many have done. (Marxist’s… just to name the most common group…) Indeed, the existence of a Divine Creator and in an afterlife is the only possible and plausible hope for justice there is.

This is because, whilst some may get justice on this earth, it is painfully apparent that no matter how idealistic and disciplined the seekers of justice or the constitutionally ordained deliverers of justice are, human nature is such that there will always be injustice no matter how hard we work to ensure that this is not the case.

The socialist experiments proved this. I am here in a so called just and civilised society (Australia) and there is still rampant injustice and racism everywhere, even though we had been struggling to eradicate injustice and human rights oppression for over a hundred years.

So if you think Mohammed Anni Nasheed or any other leader can give everybody justice, you will soon be bitterly disappointed. Or if you really believe you can bring justice for everyone, you are either naïve or dangerously deluded.

Indeed, many leaders have held this belief. Due to our human need to feel self important, this belief does not cease in the face of obvious injustice. It does become a delusion. Once a delusion forms, many others form. It leads to schizophrenic paranoia and tyranny. The only way this dangerous delusion can be broken is through humility. Yet sadly, humility is never the thing that propels people into power.

Also, and this is the hard part, this inner hope I speak of is deepened by personal suffering. Suffering without this hope becomes selfishness, bitterness, moral despair, depression or rage. It often brings hunger for blood or hunger for God like status. Yet suffering, if fused with this hope, gives inner strength, compassion, spiritual power, maturity and wisdom.

There is a reward for struggling for humanity, even though it can never be completely realized on this earth. There is also a punishment for exploiting and belittling humanity in the pursuit of personal power.

At the end of all the reward and punishment however, I believe that the source of this hope I speak of is also Merciful beyond what we humans could ever comprehend. We are all as corrupt as each other; we are all hypocrites, all of us human beings. For every good we do we will also do as much bad. It is only through the Mercy of this hope that we have any right to experience the reward for following it because, we all deserve as much punishment as we do reward.

May we strive to awaken this hope in one another through compassion…

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Restaurant cashier banished for using customer’s cash card

A City Garden restaurant cashier has been banished for six months by the Civil Court for taking Rf500 from a customer’s cash card, reports Haveeru.

Customers in the Maldives routinely give their pin number to the waiter along with their card.

The Civil Court ruled that Hassan Azhar should be banished on the basis of confession and documents, after he received the card from a waiter and used it to withdraw Rf500 without the customer’s consent.

This is the first time such a case has been prosecuted, Haveeru noted.

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Government proceeds with Nexbis signing despite ACC complaint

The Maldives has signed an agreement with Malaysian-based mobile security solutions vendor Nexbis to supply an advanced border control system for the immigration department.

The Maldives was this year placed on the US State Department watch list for human trafficking, which may narrowly eclipse the fishing industry as the second-largest contributor to the Maldivian economy after tourism.

The new system will allow the immigration department to store and retrieve the biometric data of expatriates working in the country, using fingerprint and facial recognition technology, effectively circumventing the abuse of paper documentation.

“We currently have a large number of illegal expatriates running around the country,” a source at the immigration department told Minivan News. “Right now estimate that there are 100,000 foreign workers in the country, but there are no official figures on how many may be illegal.”

Workers were arriving in the country legally “but once in the country they discard the documents and flee to islands, and seek better payment.”

Many companies in the Maldives were benefiting “and facilitating” the problem, the source said, which was impacting those companies “who do operate legally and pay visa fees to the government.”

Ensuring that workers could be accurately identified, even without documentation, is a key benefit of the new system, the source explained.

“Since people discard documents and flee when police get hold of them, it can be hard to identity who someone is unless he says so himself. Likewise we deport a lot of people, sometimes for serious crimes, who come back in the next day on a new passport. It’s a loophole.”

“Right now were are also seeing a lot of underage domestic workers coming from countries like Nepal, who have passports definitely stating they are over 18. Under 18s are considered minors and can’t work under Maldivian law, but still the trend continues. In many cases these workers are abducted and trafficked, and this new system will help us address that. We’re also trying to get a visa officer stationed in Bangladesh.”

The new technology will allow police and island officials across the Maldives to determine a worker’s identity and visa status using facial recognition software and an authorised mobile phone connected to an immigration server.

“It does not require special gadgets, and will allow people like the island or atoll councillor to get data on a runaway, and see if their visa has expired or is pending,” the source said.

The 20 year contract with Nexbis will not require upfront investment from the government; instead, Minivan News understands that the government will pay Nexbis a US$15 fee for every work permit issued under the new system.

Nexbis did not disclose terms for national security and confidentiality reasons, however the firm said it expects to begin generating revenue from the project this financial year.

The immigration department will retain full control of the system, with technical assistance provided by Nexbis during the first stages of the project.

ACC criticism

Yesterday’s signing ceremony between Immigration Controller Ilyas Hussein Ibrahim and Nexbis CEO Johan Yong ran into opposition from the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), which alleged it had received “a serious complaint” regarding “technical details” of the bid.

“We faxed a letter twice and sent another letter to the department at 9.35am after we received a complaint over the bid evaluation process. So we asked to put the signing ceremony on hold as we needed time to investigate the matter,” ACC Deputy Commissioner Muawwiz Rasheed told newspaper Haveeru.

“The law gives us the authority to take actions if our decision is violated. We have to take action if our decision is violated.”

A source within the immigration department confirmed that the ACC had sent a note to the department.

“The bid evaluation went through all the government processes. It was an international bid and included technical and financial evaluations,” the source said. “There were no issues until another independent commission was formed to evaluate some of the bids. This was not done by immigration – all bids were evaluated at the finance ministry by their pool of technical experts.”

The source claimed that there “may have been a few staff within the immigration department who have sent a letter to the ACC using their influence within [the department]. There is some sort of intention to stop the project that could have political motivations behind it.

“When we prosecute court cases and deport people for serious crimes, under the new system they will be unable to return simply by using a new passport. This will benefit police, the ministry of labour, even the tax department. I see the potential for a large improvement.”

Nexbis shares were today trading 1.43 percent higher at $0.071.

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EC disputes blame for lack of public awareness of referendum

The Elections Commission (EC) has issued a statement condemning the remarks made by President of the Adhaalath Party Sheikh Hussein Rasheed, after he criticised it for failing to raise adequate public awareness about the recent referendum.

Sheikh Rasheed said that as a result, the state had spent more than Rf 11 million (US$856,000) holding a referendum on administrative consolidation that most of the country’s eligible citizens had failed to vote in.

“My intention is to make institutions more accountable. It’s not a problem if the commission issues press releases about me, but I would prefer they listen and learn something from what I said,’’ Sheikh Rasheed told Minivan News.

He claimed that most citizens were unaware of what the referendum was about – a proposal for grouping smaller islands to form large population centres – which led to a 30 percent turnout across the country. Of 88,882 eligible voters, less than 27,000 participated in the referendum.

However the EC stated that it would contradict the commission’s independence  if it was required to inform citizens about the benefits and disadvantages of a referendum’s topic, and described attempts by political figures to disgrace the commission by suggesting otherwise as “irresponsible”.

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Comment: Skeletons in the closet

As darkness fell over the cramped city of Male’ on the eve of January 3 this year, a woman’s body was found in a suitcase dumped in a construction site. She was 30 years old.

A few days later, her boyfriend was charged for her murder.

On June 22, a little boy lost both his parents. His father was stabbed with a knife and died in a hospital. His mother gave herself up to the police for the brutal offense.

At the age of 21, she now sits in a cell, her dreams crushed and her hopes dead. The prospect of spending her long life in prison would torment her. Perhaps a more agonising pain for her is the fear of facing what her son might think of her when he grows up. Her fateful act was the tragic climax in her struggle to leave a disruptive relationship that was a daunting trap for her.

The pain and suffering these two women endured represent the lives of many others in the Maldives. They include women, children, girls and boys, aged parents and also men. They are the victims of domestic violence – a social reality locked up as a family secret and never discussed by lawmakers in the country until Monday.

Rozaina Adam, MP, young and educated, explained what she meant by domestic violence as she presented her bill to the heavily lopsided parliament – with 72 men and only five women as its members.

“Domestic violence is the violence or acts of violence that occur between married couples or between divorced couples or between family members or between members in a household”, she said. “It may be someone inflicting violence on his/her wedded partner, it may be a guardian inflicting violence on a child or someone inflicting violence on his/her elderly parents… like any other society in the world, it’s a reality in our society too.”

Her definition outlined the space where domestic violence occurs. She also brought the relationships between the victims and offenders of these horrendous actions into public focus.

A home is meant to be a safe and happy place for everyone. In Maldives, like many traditional societies, people grow up and spend their entire lives surrounded with family, relatives and neighbors. It is however, a place of indescribable horror for the victims of domestic violence.

The victims live their lives in constant pain and fear, insecurities and uncertainties, distrust and breakups. The gruesome realities they face make them strong enough to bear the pain but often,  too weak to get out of it or end it.

Home is a boundary known to them, no matter how gross it is. Sometimes, leaving home means crossing over to uncertainty and face a greater fear of the unknown. They absorb the worst atrocities in their homes, imposed on them by their supposedly loved ones. In effect they hide their woes silently behind a smile or a deadpan mask, until life is forced out of them or it dies within on them, like it did for these two women.

Research, media reports and official records indicate a staggering level of domestic violence in the Maldives.

A study in 2007 showed, one in every three women aged 15-49 experienced physical or sexual violence at some point in their lives.

According to an official source, 620 cases of abuse were reported to them from August 2005 to 2009. They include 200 cases on sexual abuse, 150 cases on physical abuse, 50 cases of rape and 50 cases on neglect and more. The number of cases reported to them on average stands at 145 per year since 2006.

On Sunday evening, the Deputy Minister of Health and Family, Ms Mariya Ali informed that the number of reported cases on domestic violence now stands at 100.

These statistics reveal a shocking truth, considering the clandestine nature of domestic violence, the stark absence of relevant legislation and the lack of necessary support for victims. It confirms the high prevalence of domestic violence in our small Muslim society and the urgent need to address it through law.

Since July this year, the local media has reported 9 incidents of rape including two cases of gang rape in the past week alone. Health officials warn that the incidence of rape could be much higher as rape is far more common among married couples.

Meanwhile, the political and social space in Maldives continues to get filled by a religious narrative that reinforces women as sexual objects. For instance, a question and answer posted on the website of Ministry of Islamic Affairs dominated by a religious pressure group called the Adhalaath Party reads:

“It has become very common for a woman to tell her husband ‘I do not want to sleep with you’, ‘I won’t do as you say’, ‘I will live my life the way I want’. What does Islam say about such women?”

The answer was provided by Sheikh Usman Abdulla – a renowned and respected Islamic scholar.

It says: “the main purpose of being married is to fulfill your sexual needs. In reality, the woman cannot say that. She has to obey her husband. Islam says if your husband wants you, you have to go (to him) even if you are cooking (in the kitchen). While this is how it is (in Islam), what the woman said is not acceptable in Islam.”

The impact of such narrative on women and children should not be under-estimated – especially in view of the general profile of the victims and the offenders. According to the reports on abuse, 9 out of every 10 victims were females and nearly 6 out of every 10 victims were below 18 years. It also revealed 8 out of every 10 offenders is a friend or a family member of the victim. And in 5 out of every 10 cases, the offender is the victim’s boyfriend or husband.

The horrific reality reflected by the records of abuse emphasizes the dire need for legislators to get their act together and treat domestic violence as a nonpartisan issue. It requires unequivocal support for the proposed bill by all parliamentarians. No one desires a repeat of the violent actions that unfurled at the beginning of this year.

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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Foreigners to buy property in the Maldives for first time

Soneva Gili is to sell private residences to foreign investors, the first time foreigners have been permitted to buy private residences in the Maldives, according to premium property magazine Countrylife.

The 14 water bungalows on Lankanfushi Island are expected to attract up to US$7 million each.

Each of the four-bedroom houses will be built from renewable and natural materials and will include an over-water pool, sauna, gym and staff quarters for butlers.

The properties will be sold over a 50 year leasehold with an option to extend to 90 years, with a guaranteed gross rental yield of up to five percent for buys who subscribe to resort’s rental programme.

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Can a 100 percent Muslim nation also be a democracy, asks Huffington Post

Can a nation that considers itself 100 percent Muslim also be a democracy without risking its Islamic identity and ideals, asks Vishal Arora in the Huffington Post.

That’s what this tiny island nation off the southern coast of India is trying to do. Two years after the country embraced democracy, a literary festival imported from the West shows the promise -and peril – of that experiment.

Every year, an estimated 700,000 tourists flock to this postcard-perfect chain of about 1,100 islands. Before they can hit the beach, however, they must complete a customs form that includes a list of “prohibited and restricted” imports, including “materials contrary to Islam,” “idols for worship,” pork products and alcohol.

The restrictions are lingering vestiges of the 30-year rule of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, a conservative authoritarian who yielded power in the country’s first democratic elections in 2008.

Yet even with the change in government, there’s been little desire for a change in policy on religious restrictions.

Full story

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Young Maldivians ensure Hay is made in the sunshine

Hay Festival organisers were last night pondering how to get festival-goers dancing to French DJ Ravin, who was blending electronic fusion with distinctly local bodu-beru rhythms for an appreciative crowd shuffling around the outskirts of the dance floor.

“Ask MNBC to stop broadcasting live,” suggested a nearby young Maldivian.

It was like flicking a switch. Almost immediately a horde of youngsters formed a mosh pit and raved for three solid hours in what was no doubt one of the most energetic parties ever seen on the presidential retreat of Aarah.

As they hooted and cheered his name, Ravin could be seen on stage shaking his head with amazement at what was probably one of the DJ’s most enthusiastic audiences.

Ravin’s set was the finale of two days of literary and cultural events – the Maldives’ first major literature festival – with authors and artists international and local discussing their work and craft. The attendance and involvement of young people was particularly noticeable, as were the many families relaxing and playing in the sunshine.

Reassuringly for the authors, the on-site bookshop did a roaring trade with queues for book signings. Jung Chang’s Wild Swans and Ian McEwan’s Solar were particularly popular, and young Maldivians were observed tottering around Aarah underneath huge stacks of tomes freshly-purchased and those brought from home to be signed. Judging the look of exhaustion on McEwan’s face in the green room after his signing session, every McEwan novel in the country now has a signature.

Despite a slow beginning – less than 10 tickets were sold on the first day they went on sale – huge last minute demand forced organisers to issue 200 more tickets for both days. Such was the last minute demand that a brisk black market trade sprang up, with tickets purchased for Rf100 being sold at the Aarah ferry queue for up to Rf300.

Climate change was a distinctive theme of the event. Environment Minister Mohamed Aslam announced that the Maldives has applied to UNESCO to declare the entirety of Baa Atoll a protected biosphere reserve, while the President’s advisor on climate change Mark Lynas spoke on the challenges facing the government’s 10 year road to carbon neutrality.

A Hay-goer in a modern interpretation of traditional Maldivian dress

Monty Don, President of the UK-based Soil Association and an early proponent of organic food, spoke of the need for populations to source their food locally, while award-winning foreign correspondent Peter Godwin spoke of the political and social decline of his homeland Zimbabwe at the hands of Robert Mugabe.

Jung Chang, author of the internationally acclaimed novel Wild Swans and autobiography Mao: The Untold Story, spoke about her experiences growing up amid the cultural revolution, joining Mao’s Red Guard, and her growing understanding of his brutality.

Ian McEwan finished the lineup, introducing his climate change satire Solar about a Nobel prize-winning and climate scientist and womaniser who discovers how to cheaply extract hydrogen from water using photosynthesis.

Hay Festival Project Director Andy Fryers said he was delighted at the reception to the sell-out festival, “particularly the exuberance of the crowd once they realised what Hay was about.”

“One of the speakers said it was fantastic that there was such a youthful and questioning audience. People were really engaged,” Fryers said.

A key challenge of the festival was introducing the concept of a lecture – sitting and listening to a speaker and then opening the session up a debate – which was a new idea for the Maldives, Fryers said, if one that was eagerly embraced.

Other challenges included ensuring that a wide-range of people were brought on board, and that the event was “inclusive, not exclusive.”

“It was amazing to see 60-70 young volunteers appear virtually out of the ground and put in hours of their own time to make it happen,” he added.

Ian McEwan and Peter Godwin speaking at Hay

The Hay organisers have begun talking about ideas for a possible repeat of the festival next year.

“We always say we try to give a new destination three years, unless something catastrophic happens, to capitalise on all the hard work of the first year,” Fryers said. “We’ve already started talking about how to take the idea forward in the Maldives.”

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Local council elections scheduled for February 5, 2011

The Elections Commission (EC) has announced that the local council elections will take place on February 5, 2011, two months after the period stipulated in the Local Council Election Act.

EC President Fuad Thaufeeq told Minivan News today that the commission took into consideration the number of public holidays, including the end of the year school holidays, as well as the rights of candidates.

“If we ignored these holidays and conducted the local council elections, many people will experience difficulties,’’ he said.

He added that the courts and government offices would face difficulties if the EC did not take public holidays into account.

“If the commission decided if a candidate was not eligible, the person would have to file the case at the High Court and the court will determine whether he is eligible,” Fuad explained. “But if that sort of issue was raised when the courts are closed, that would be a much bigger problem. So we decided to hold the elections in February next year.’’

While the constitutional deadline for council elections elapsed in July 2009, enabling legislation for the elections was ratified by President Mohamed Nasheed on July 29, 2010.

The Local Council Elections Act stipulates that elections must take within a 122-day period after ratification.

”Dates are not applied, all the due dates have been passed,” said Fuad. “If we have to conduct it according to the deadlines we cannot do this at all.”

In accordance with the Decentralisation Act, the list of 184 administrative constituencies was published in the government gazette on Thursday.

Following the public referendum on October 9 on the government’s proposal for administrative consolidation, Addu Atoll is listed as a single island.

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