Tag: media

Couple who died in Kuredu crash had been married for just seven days

The young couple who died following a quad bike accident at Kuredu Island Resort early on Saturday morning have been identified in the UK press as Emma and Jonathan Gray.

The two British honeymooners, who were aged in their mid-twenties and had a six-month old child, had only been married for seven days when the quad bike they were riding on as passengers crashed into a tree, reported the Daily Mail, among others.

The driver, a foreign national who has not yet been formally identified by police, was injured in the accident and is reportedly being treated in ADK Hospital in Male’. Minivan News understands that the driver was not a staff member at the resort.

Police Sub-Inspector Ahmed Shiyam confirmed that the vehicle involved in the incident – initially reported in the local media to be a golf buggy of the kind commonly used in the Maldives to transport guests and their luggage – was a quad bike.

The vehicle collided with a tree and police were informed by resort management at 4:15am that two guests had been found with injuries.

Local newspaper Haveeru reported that Jonathan Gray died at the scene of the incident while Emma Gray died before she could be taken to hospital for treatment.

“Police are investigating how this incident occurred. We are confident at this point that it was an accident,” Shiyam told Minivan News.

Minivan News understands that the UK High Commission is assisting with the investigation.

The resort has meanwhile told media that it is unable to make a statement while the incident is being investigated by police.

Another British national, 42-year old Sharon Duval, died on Kuredu in October 2010, also while honeymooning with her husband, after her body was found on the beach by another guest.

An Oxfordshire inquest into Duval’s death ruled out “any third party involvement” while a portmortem conducted in the UK found that her blood alcohol level was three and a half times the legal UK driving limit, and gave the cause of death as accidental drowning with a contribution of alcohol intoxication.

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Nexbis signals willingness to negotiate border control agreement

Mobile security system vendor Nexbis, which is behind the stalled build, operate and transfer agreement to upgrade the Maldives’ immigration system, has issued a statement welcoming the government’s decision to proceed with the project and said it is willing to negotiate the terms of the contract.

The upgrade was stalled earlier this year when the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) expressed concerns about the deal, claiming that there were “opportunities for corruption” during the bidding process.

“A number of further gross inaccuracies continue to be perpetrated, whether intentionally or through ignorance, particularly regarding the cost of the contract,” Nexbis said in its statement.

“Despite sensationalist claims in the media regarding [the tender process], the terms agreed to by the parties, or the suitability of the system being provided, Nexbis will be delivering a state-of-the-art, flexible and cost-effective security solution.”

Under the 20 year agreement, Nexbis levies a fee of US$2 from arriving and departing passengers in exchange for installing, maintaining and upgrading its immigration system, and a fee of US$15 for every work permit card.

“This means that neither the government nor the Maldivian public have to pay in exchange for a state-of-the-art border security protection,” Nexbis claimed.

The company said that “although the bid proposed a fee to be applied to all travellers including Maldivians”, the company waived the charges for Maldivians “as a goodwill gesture.”

“In addition Nexbis is providing a five percent revenue share to the government should passenger numbers grow. In stark contrast to some of the other bids, we have not requested a guaranteed minimum volume of passengers. Essentially the company must bear the cost risk should the number of visitors to the Maldives drop as has previously occurred during the tsunami and financial crisis.”

Immigration Controller Abdulla Shahid has expressed concern over both the cost and necessity of the project, calculating that with continued growth in tourist numbers Nexbis would be earning US$200 million in revenue over the 20 year lifespan of the agreement.

At five percent, royalties to the government would come to US$10 million, Shahid said, when there was little reason for the government not be earning the revenue itself by operating a system given by a donor country.

“Border control is not something we are unable to comprehend – it is a normal thing all over the world,” Shahid told Minivan News.

“There is no costing of the equipment Nexbis is installing – we don’t know how much it is costing to install, only how much we have to pay. We need to get everything out in the open.”

Nexbis meanwhile argues that “reasonable persons will likely realise that once the hidden costs after are taken into account and adjusted for inflation, the benefits and efficiencies of the Nexbis system will far outweigh the risk, inadequacies and uncertainties of any such alleged cheaper system.”

“This frees up the [Department of Immigration] from managing systems and securing the budget year in, year out to ensure the system is maintained. This will prevent interruption of service and avoid potential corruption as there will no longer be a need to purchase equipment every year.”

Shahid however estimates that maintaining a free system given by a donor country would cost at most several hundred thousand dollars a year, and said he was unsure as to why such an agreement had ever been signed.

“Airport charges are calculated based on government expenditure – such as the cost of the immigration counters. The US$18 collected as an airport tax is included in the ticket, and in the end [under this agreement] the amount for immigration will be going to Nexbis,” he said.

He further noted that despite Nexbis offering not to charge Maldivians for use of the service as a “goodwill gesture”, there was no mention in the contract that Maldivians would have to pay at the border: “the contract says every foreigner,” he said.

Shahid would not comment on the specifics of the pending negotiations with Nexbis, but said that the Immigration Department had the government’s full support in the matter.

Nexbis meanwhile said it had agreed to review the government’s additional requirements, “and have expressed our willingness to accommodate any such changes within commercially viable terms.”

“We have this requires some changes to the solution we ultimately provide, then it is within the scope of our agreement to accommodate these changes,” the company said.

Meanwhile, an ongoing police investigation into labour trafficking in the Maldives last week uncovered an industry worth an estimated US$123 million, eclipsing fishing (US$46 million in 2007) as the second greatest contributor of foreign currency to the Maldivian economy after tourism.

Police discovered several thousand passports confiscated from expatriate workers during a recent raid of 18 ‘paper companies’, created to fraudulently apply for work permit quotas. The imported workers, many of them illiterate and from rural Bangladesh, are then typically employed for a pittance under substandard conditions or else simply abandoned at the airport after having paid up to US$2000 to bogus recruitment agencies.

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Out on a wing: Mega bets on Chinese market

The shifting demographics of the Maldives tourism industry presents new challenges – and a great many opportunities – for the country to grow as a destination, says CEO of new Maldivian flag carrier Mega Maldives, George Weinmann, during a ceremony in Male’ this week to mark the airline’s launch of direct flights to Shanghai and Beijing.

Since its maiden flight between Gan and Hong Kong early this year, Mega has focused on the country’s booming Chinese market. Chinese visitors last year showed the highest number of arrivals over more established markets, and were widely credited with insulating the Maldives from the effects of the economic recession afflicting the UK and Europe.

Weinmann emphasises that “while the Chinese market is now the number one market for the Maldives, is still not a mature market.”

“The agents in China don’t know the Maldives as well as the European agents who have been coming here for 30 years,” he explains. “The new agents are often asking us for help finding hotel rooms, and negotiate with the hotels – it’s not really our job, we’re an airline and there’s plenty of travel agencies on both sides – but oftentimes they aren’t connected. There have been incidents in the past where certain agents get very excited and think they can just fly their guests here, only to find there are no hotel rooms for their guests.”

Without intending to become a travel agency, the airline had found itself becoming an intermediary between the Chinese tour operators and resorts, he says, many of which are still getting to grips with the unique demands of the new market.

“We talk to resorts that are suffering with occupancy, perhaps 30-40 percent,” says Mega’s Marketing Director Ali Faiz, “and see how we can help each other. We also meet with resorts that are popular with the Chinese market and offer our jet to help them sell the Maldives.”

Whereas European guests tend to stay up to two weeks at resorts, the current trip pattern for Chinese visitors is very short – “four nights, five days,” says Weinmann.

“They are much more activity focused – a little less sun and sea, a little more doing things on a boat,” he says. “Like every other market they are very food conscious – but the type of food they are looking for is different, which for instance affects how we cater for inflight meals –  although everyone likes ice-cream,” he adds.

Moreover, “as someone who has lived in China for seven years – they are huge spenders. The Chinese love to buy things. One complaint they may have with the Maldives is that there is not enough stuff to buy – they come here often with large wads of money and then go home with it. That’s an opportunity for local businessmen.”

The market is also rather risk adverse, which the fledgling airline found to its detriment in May when Hong Kong authorities issued a travel warning for the Maldives, triggered by excitable global media coverage of opposition-led protests in Male’.

“That was a near tragedy for us. We almost didn’t survive that period,” Weinmann acknowledges. “It came at the same time as changes on our side with pricing, and we almost lost the entire month of May because people who had been intending to go to the Maldives but hadn’t yet bought their tickets decided not to go.

“There was very low additional sales in May. Those people who had already bought their tickets – who had spent hundreds of dollars on rooms – couldn’t get that money back so they came anyway, and of course there were no problems. But when a warning like that goes out, anybody who has the discretion to choose not to buy, to choose somewhere else or postpone their trip, will do so. It doesn’t matter if it’s a yellow, red or black warning – it’s a huge hit. Just ask people in Thailand about what they experienced during their local turmoil. It is a roller-coaster ride in terms of bookings.”

Mega worked with resorts and the government to try and reassure visitors that the protests were limited to a few streets of the capital city – which few visitors to the country even set foot on.

“Recovery takes time,” Weinmann says. “When the incidents are over, then you have to go out and educate the market and tell all the travel agents what is going on. For a market like China that is growing as fast as it is, they do have other choices, and they are not as comfortable with the Maldives as the European market, which sees such incidents as a small bump in road.”

“We did obviously recover,” he adds, “because we launched Beijing-Shanghai a couple of months later, and that’s been very successful.”

Mega subsequently decided to introduce free cancellation insurance for every ticket, covering the first night of accommodation in the event of a delayed flight, which Weinmann explains was a way of offsetting the non-negotiable cancellation policies of many resorts in the Maldives.

“It’s one of the biggest issues in the Asian market right now,” he said. “We are competing against other Asian markets such as Bali and Thailand, and other island destinations such as Guam that are developing very fast, and in many of these countries hotels don’t have the kind of cancellation policies that exist in the Maldives. It makes it more risky for tour operators to sell the Maldives – we’re trying to eliminate that risk.”

Weinmann believes the Maldives also has room to grow existing markets, and said Mega hoped to launch flights to so-called ‘tier 2’ cities and stimulate growth in places such as Eastern Europe.

Korea also has more potential, he explained, noting that Mega would introduce a flight to Seoul in September.

“There are current five wide-body aircraft flying between Korea and Hawaii every day. That’s a nine hour flight, and the Maldives is probably a little cheaper.”

India, on the Maldives’ doorstep, was exactly two years behind China he predicts.

“But it’s a challenge that regulations prevent a Maldivian carrier flying more than 200 seats to Mumbai or Delhi. We have 250 seats, and we’d like to change that.”

Cargo imports are another growth opportunity, Weinmann says, announcing 15 discounted tickets to kickstart a trade delegation of Maldivian traders and businessmen to find opportunities in China.

“Right now all the cargo coming into the Maldives goes through Sri Lanka, Singapore or Dubai,” he explains. “Not much is produced in these locations, it’s all coming from somewhere else – a lot of it from China. We want to increase direct imports from China which should mean less cost and cheaper prices, as there will be less middlemen involved.”

Meanwhile, the airline has begun recruiting more Maldivian cabin crew, in addition to the two classes already through, and is currently training six Maldivian pilots and soon, engineering cadets. Weinmann predicts the company will employ over 100 Maldivian staff by the end of the year.

“We not doing this just because we want to, but because it’s the right thing for the airline. We think Maldives aviation can grow a lot further,” he says.

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HRCM sends report to UN Human Rights Committee

Endemic sexual violence against women and children, violent crime, abuse of migrant labourers and a persistent culture of torture in detention facilities are among a catalogue of serious issues facing the country, the Human Rights Commission of the Maldives (HRCM) has informed the UN Human Rights Committee.

The document summarises areas relevant to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which the Maldives acceded to in 2006. It heavily references the Maldives Journalists Association (MJA) and several news sources, including Haveeru and Minivan News, with little reference to primary research conducted by HRCM itself.

Violence against women

“One in five women between the ages of 15 and 49 years reported physical or sexual violence by a partner, and one in nine reported experiencing severe violence,” HRCM noted, referencing a 2006 study by the then Ministry of Gender and Family.

“One in six women in the capital Male’ and one in eight countrywide reported experiencing childhood sexual abuse under the age of 15 years. Of those women between the ages of 15 and 49 years who had ever been pregnant, 6 percent reported having been physically or sexually abused during pregnancy,” it cited.

“The survey further reported that many respondents’ perceived women to be subordinate to men, and that men used Islam to justify restrictions and violence against women.”

Parallel to this, HRCM observed a particularly low conviction rate for rapists and sexual assault offenders.

Reasons for this, the report claimed, included “the absence of an Evidence Act, the lack of witness protections provisions and fear of reprisals by abusers, finding witnesses (two male or equivalent women), awareness on the side of the victim regarding the condition that she should be in while reporting, such as not showering before consulting medical personnel, lack of national guidelines on medico-legal documentation, failures of existing laws and procedures leading to re‐victimisation of the victim, and intimidation of being stigmatised by the community.”

Forced labour

Abuse of migrant workers in the Maldives is occurring on an industrial scale, with at least 30,000 foreign workers (8-10 percent of the total population of the country), completely undocumented. Most of these are Bangladeshi nationals, with 2200 of those 2700 migrant workers deported in 2009 by the Department of Immigration and Emigration of Bangladeshi origin, HRCM noted.

“The State needs to enforce existing regulations relating to work place standards and regularly monitor the same,” the report noted. “In addition, the state should develop a mechanism whereby the wages to the workers are duly paid and the travel documents of migrant workers are not held in hands of employers in order to eliminate the undue influence by employers on the migrant workers to work in unfavourable conditions, including forcing them to do labour against their will.”

Documents of migrant workers such as passports were routinely confiscated by employers, the report stated.

“In the Maldives, it is a practice to take hold of the passport of the migrant worker by his/her owner for the intention of safe keeping, and this applies to both government and private sector together with the individuals,” HRCM said.

HRCM observed that the maximum fine facing labour traffickers for fines under the Employment Act was Rf 5000 (US$324). It noted that the Maldives had conceded to ratify the International Convention on Protection of Rights of All Migrant Workers and Their Families (ICPRMWF).

Violent crime

HRCM noted six crime-related deaths in 2010 and eight in 2009, and stated that this was high relative to the population.

“It is to be noted that most of the people who are involved in cases of extreme violence, and murders are repeat offenders (sometimes juveniles) providing clear evidence into the failure of the criminal justice system in the country,” HRCM stated.

Factors involved, the report noted, included “inadequate legislation pertaining the criminal justice system, such as a Penal Code does not reflect the spirit of the present Constitution, inadequate legislation pertaining to evidence and witnesses, dismissal of forensic evidence by courts, absence of a witness protection program and inadequate correctional and rehabilitation system for convicted offenders.”

Detention concerns

Visits from the National Preventive Mechanism (NPM) to Dhoonidhoo Police Custodial in March 2011 identified that five detainees had been kept in solitary confinement cells for periods ranging from several days to up to four months, without being let outside for exercise, HRCM stated,

HRCM also raised concerns about the standard of a “hastily built” jail in Addu Atoll in 2009, consisting of metal cages, to accommodate prisoners following a prison fire in Maafushi, and the confiscation of clothing as a disciplinary measure.

HRCM noted a general failure to keep arrested suspects separate from convicted criminals, and commented on the use of Maafushi prison as a police custodial.

The report also stated that “a high profile politician, Mr Abdulla Yameen, was held under protective police custody for a short period in 2010 in a place outside the formally established places for police custody” (Yameen, the leader of the opposition-aligned People’s Alliance and the former President’s half-brother, was detained in the Presidential Retreat at Aarah).

HRCM expressed concern that “in the case of Mr Yameen, he has not been compensated so far [for his detention on the Presidential Retreat].”

Read the full report

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IFJ condemns police investigation of DhiFM’s leaked exam paper story

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has questioned the decision by the Maldives Police Service to ask DhiFM news editor Mohamed Jinah Ali about the authenticity of a news story concerning a leaked examination paper.

The report, aired on December 29, 2010, alleged that an international standard O’Level examination paper was leaked and later found hidden in a fish container.

Police Sub-Inspector Ahmed Shiyam told Minivan News that police were asked to investigate the accuracy of the story by the Department of Public Examinations (DPE).

“They say the story was completely false,” Shiyam said.

Police had discussed the matter with the Maldives Media Council (MMC) which had not sought to block police from investigating the case, Shiyam said.

While defamation has been decriminalised in the Maldives, disseminating false information technically remains a crime under the 1968 Penal Code, and attracts a fine of between Rf25-200 (US$1.6-US$12.9) depending on severity.

Deputy Minister of Education Dr Abdulla Nazeer told Minivan News that the story published by DhiFM concerned an exam conducted by a private company and had no connection with the Department of Public Examination, as inferred in the story.

“There is no truth in it at all – we had a chat with the guy who reported it. It was a private company conducting the exam – it had nothing to do with the DPE,” he said. “The guy at DhiFM who reported it told us he heard it from a guy who worked at Sri Lankan Airlines. It was a sensitive issue fabricated for the sake of gaining publicity.”

Dr Nazeer claimed the DPE had approached police over the matter “because at the time there was no media authority.”

President of the Maldives Media Council (MMC) Mohamed Nazeef however expressed concern about the government’s request that police investigate a matter concerning media ethics.

“The complaint made [by the DPE] was about DhiFM’s story – there doesn’t seem to have been a crime committed,” Nazeef said. “So what are the police trying to investigate?”

He speculated that the DPE may have made the complaint seeking to identify the source of the story within its own department.

“The original story said that the information came from an informant inside the department. What they probably want to know is the name of the official,” Nazreef suggested.

“I don’t know whether the story is true – journalists report from their sources. If there is an issue with [a story] then the complaint should be sent to the media council, or the broadcasting commission. The constitution guarantees the protection of sources.”

Nazreef noted that the MMC had no role in the matter while it was being investigated by official authority, such as the police.

“We are waiting to see how this goes off. If it goes against the Constitution we will issue a statement,” he said. “It will take some time for us to digest new media freedoms. There is a long tradition in this country of going to the police and seeking the punishment of journalists for something they have published.”

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Media bodies slam police questioning of reporter accuracy

The police service has come under renewed criticism from media bodies like the Maldives Journalist Association (MJA) over claims it continues to stifle free speech by questioning reporters over both the identity of sources and the accuracy of their stories.

The MJA’s concerns relate specifically to the recent decision by police to summon DhiFM News Editor Mohamed Jinah Ali for questioning to prove the accuracy of a news report from December 29, 2010.  The report itself alleged that an international standard O’ Level examination paper was leaked and found hidden in a fish container in the country.

MJA founder and President, Ahmed ‘Hiriga’ Zahir, has told Minivan News that he is “very worried” that police were operating outside of their constitutional role by questioning journalists and media outlets over the accuracy of news reports. Similar concerns have been shared by the Maldives Media Council (MMC), which has said it also holds reservations over the nature of police questioning of journalists, despite itself calling for more professionalism and training within the national media.

In addressing these criticisms, Police Sub-Inspector Ahmed Shiyam confirmed to Minivan News that authorities had spoken with the DhiFM editor in regards to the examination paper story, after it received complaints concerning the accuracy of the report and its relation to an ongoing investigation.

“Before we go ahead with any case on this matter, we needed to confirm if [DhiFM] are standing by their story,” Shiyam said. “We requested that if the story is true, then the reporter had to prove the details to us.”

The Department of Public Examinations that oversees handling of the papers has reportedly denied there is any truth to claims in the report that an international examination had been leaked.

According to police, the DhiFM report had claimed that an unidentified source within the Department of Public Examinations had revealed details of the alleged loss of the examination paper.

However, in responding to concerns from organisations like the MJA that it was for specialised authorities like the MMC and not the police to decide upon the legitimacy of a story, Shiyam said that law enforcement authorities had to respond to complaints received by members of the public, even in regards to the media.

“We don’t want to have to deal with issues like this, but there are presently many problems with the report,” he said. “Once we have confirmed whether the report is factual or not, then we will decide whether to send any case to the media council (MMC).”

However, the Police sub-inspector was unable to share the exact nature of the its concerns or the complaints made regarding the report when asked by Minivan News.

In responding to the police questioning of the DhiFM editor, MJA president Ahmed ‘Hiriga’ Zahir claimed that whether the report was true or not, the country had a specific journalism authority in the MMC that deals with potential issues of ethics and professionalism in the media. Hiriga said that he believed it therefore remained important to keep the police from overseeing media in this way.

The MJA founder gave a hypothetical example of the problems he believed police questioning posed for the media. Hiriga pointed out that if the media was confronted by a source within police detailing possible unethical practices by law enforcement officials, the media should be free to report this without possible prosecution.

“This really raises questions over freedom of expression in the country,” he said. “I don’t know if the report is true or not, but it is not the role of the police to decide this.”

Hiriga added that the country’s journalists were also protected under article 28 of the Maldives’ constitution. This article prevents reporters from having to give up the identities of their sources to police if they did not wish to do so.

The President of the Maldives Media Council (MMC) Mohamed Nazeef said that it had been made aware of the questioning issue by DhiFM, but added that no decision had been taken yet on its next course of action.

Nazeef added that he was concerned however that police had appeared to become involved in deciding upon issues of media ethics and the factual nature of an article’s content, which was the main purpose of the MMC.  The media council, which has an elected board of eight representatives from the media and seven public members, has stated aims of trying to safeguard a free national press that acts in a responsible manner, as well as reviewing complaints over coverage.

Rather than a problem that should be seen solely as an issue for police to resolve though, the MMC president said that it was important for society as a whole to break away from a long-standing culture of looking to punish the media for its reportage.

“There is a culture within society to want to punish the media through measures like giving prison sentences to journalists for their reporting. The way of thinking has changed now and we can’t penalise the media just because of something we might not like,” he claimed. “However, I think we need to see changes both within the media and the public too.  Society needs to accept that media is now free and can report on any issue, while the media has to be more professional in how it reports the news and trains journalists.”

As a wider concern, media freedom – and the industry’s responsibility in exercising it – has remained a prevalent issues for the country during the last year, both in terms of the right of police to question reporters and editorial independence.

Back in May, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) released a report entitled ‘Press Freedom in Peril‘ relating to the South Asia region that claimed there were a number of issues in the Maldives where “discord between journalists and the government is rife”.

In the findings, SAMSN stated that “going beyond the perception-based indexes of press freedom that have put Maldives among the most rapidly improving countries in terms of media reform, there are certain difficulties that journalists in the nation continue to face, even if these are not reflected in the broad numerical indexes, which are admittedly of limited value.”

However, the Maldivian media – including the government-owned Maldives National Broadcasting Company (MNBC) – is frequently accused of overt political bias in favouring one or other of the major political parties, viewed as a legacy of decades of autocratic governance and a state-controlled media establishment.

Several opposition-allied MPs and businessmen remain key owners of much of the country’s private media, and visiting journalism trainers have previously voiced concerns from young Maldivian journalists that senior editorial management obstruct them from reporting ethically.

Iraq Editorial Manager for the Institute of War and Peace Reporting (IWPR), Tiare Rath, observed in September 2010 following a series of journalism workshops that “one of the major issues all my students talked about is resistance among newsroom leadership – editors and publishers.”

“Even if the journalists support and understand the principles being taught, they consistently tell me they cannot apply them,” Rath said.
“This is a very, very serious problem that needs to be addressed.”

However, despite the issues of self-regulation facing the media, local press associations have continued to raise concerns about the conduct of police in questioning journalists over controversial and politically sensitive issues.

In February, the MJA spoke out along with other prominent media figures like the editor of the Haveeru newspaper to criticise police for requesting to speak with some of its journalists regarding the identity of sources on which it based a report.

The story focused on an alleged blackmail ring that reportedly obtained pornographic images of some high-profile national figures through the internet, which has been the basis of an ongoing police investigation. Haveeru said at the time that its staff declined to reveal the identities of its sources.

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“Discrepancies” prompt MNDF to oversee IT upgrade to curb labour trafficking

The Maldives will not become “a nest for human trafficking”, President Mohamed Nasheed pledged during his weekly radio address, although he acknowledged “many failures in the efforts by government agencies to maintain expatriate records.”

Speaking during his weekly radio address, Nasheed said there were discrepancies between the numbers of expatriate workers reported by the Human Resources, Youth and Sports and the Department of Immigration and Emigration.

The Human Resources Ministry claimed there were 74,000 foreign workers in the country, Nasheed said, while records at the Department of Immigration said there were 94,000 – suggesting that at least six percent of the country’s population is unaccounted for.

Nasheed said the government estimated that 40,000 expatriates in the country were working illegally. The situation had reached “an alarming level”, he said, “due to failure to investigate illegal workers, and lack of a systematic approach to [monitor] arrivals, employment and living conditions of expatriates.”

The President said he had tasked the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) with overseeing the upgrade of IT and infrastructure at both the Human Resources Ministry and the Immigration Department.

He also announced the launch of a special police investigation into “any unlawful activity that might have led to the increasing number of illegal workers.”

“We will do everything possible to make the Maldives a country that respects human dignity, and ensure all Maldivians respect human rights and pursue a civilised lifestyle,” Nasheed said.

The government has placed greater urgency on addressing the problem of labour trafficking amid wider concerns over the health of the economy – particularly the foreign currency shortage. One report from the Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) estimates that every expatriate worker remits US$100 per month to their families back home, for a total drain of US$8 million every month – a greater amount than the country earns from its new Tourism Goods and Services Tax.

By far the greatest number of expatriate labourers in the country are Bangladeshi nationals, and to a much lesser extent, Sri Lanka.

Former High Commissioner of Bangladesh Professor Selia Mohsin told Minivan News last year that 40 Bangladeshi nationals were arriving at the High Commission’s reception desk daily, “having come to the Maldives and found they have nothing to do”. She claimed that unscrupulous employment brokers in both countries were exploiting potentially hundreds of millions of dollars a year from illiterate and uneducated rural Bangladeshi families desperate for better opportunities.

Under Maldivian law, foreign workers arriving in the Maldives must have a work permit issued by the Immigration Department. This is obtained through an employer or agent, who must first request a foreign worker quota from the Ministry of Trade and Human Resources.

“The Maldivian [side] gets into connection with the Bangladeshi brokers, gets a business permit from the Ministry of Human Resources, says they want to recruit and gets a quota for more workers than they require – if they require any at all – and then ask a Bangladeshi counterpart to bring in the workers,” Professor Mohsin told Minivan News last year.

Brokers charged individual workers up to US$4000 to arrange their employment in the Maldives, she said, explaining that in many cases the family home and land was sold or mortgaged to raise this fee, split two-thirds in favour of the Maldivian broker.

One case that arrived on her desk – an application approved by the Ministry of Human Resources – was a request for 1800 workers for an unspecified construction project.

“Those people would have come [to Male’] had I not checked. Had I not done it, 1800 people would have sold their homes and become delinquent in the Maldives. This did not bother a Maldivian broker,” she said at the time. “Hell is not good enough for the people who are doing this.”

More recently, Immigration Controller Abdulla Shahid revealed that Bangladeshi nationals will be issued work visas by the Maldives High Commission in the national capital of Dhaka, in an attempt to address booming numbers of workers arriving in the country. These workers would require additional documents verified and issued in Bangladesh before their work visas and ID cards could be issued in the Maldives.

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Government invites IFJ to Maldives “to judge for itself”, after journalist body backs MBC

The Foreign Ministry of the Maldives has invited a delegation from the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) to the Maldives “to judge [for themselves] whether the local media is able to meet the needs of the public it serves, and of freedom of expression in the Maldives.”

The invitation was given after the IFJ issued a statement supporting the transfer of assets of the Maldives National Broadcast Corporation (MNBC) to parliament’s Maldives Broadcasting Corporation (MBC).

The MNBC is a 100 percent government-owned corporation that controls the assets of the former State Broadcaster Television Maldives (TVM) and Voice of Maldives (VOM).

In April 2010 the then-opposition majority parliament triggered a tug-of-war for control of the state broadcaster after it created MBC, appointed a board, and then ordered MNBC transfer the assets to the new body. Following a refusal to do so by the President’s Office, a Civil Court ruling last week ordered the transfer take place within 20 days. The government has said it intends to appeal.

“The IFJ has consistently argued the case for public service journalism which is independent of state control and insulated from a dependence on advertising revenue which is known to often impair editorial independence,” said IFJ’s Asia-Pacific Director Jacqueline Park.

“The Maldives Journalists’ Association (MJA), an IFJ affiliate, has placed on record its belief that the empowerment of the autonomous corporation [MBC], which has been designated as a public service broadcaster under Maldives’ national law, is key to raising awareness during a challenging time of transition for the Indian Ocean republic.”

The Foreign Ministry claimed that “Unfortunately the current MBC Board was appointed at a time when the opposition majority of the People’s Majlis was being used for obvious political reasons.”

“However, the government looks forward to the day when the MBC can function as an independent, impartial and objective State broadcaster, backed by an independent and well-respected Board.”

The Maldivian media – including MNBC – is frequently accused of overt political bias favouring one or other of the major political parties, a legacy of decades of autocratic governance and a state-controlled media establishment.

Several opposition-allied MPs and businessmen remain key owners of much of the country’s private media, and visiting journalism trainers have voiced concerns from young Maldivian journalists that senior editorial management obstruct them from reporting ethically.

Iraq Editorial Manager for the Institute of War and Peace Reporting (IWPR), Tiare Rath, observed in September 2010 following a series of journalism workshops that “one of the major issues all my students talked about is resistance among newsroom leadership – editors and publishers.”

“Even if the journalists support and understand the principles being taught, they consistently tell me they cannot apply them,” Rath said.

“This is a very, very serious problem that needs to be addressed.”

Inviting the IFJ to the Maldives, the Foreign Ministry said it requested that the IFJ “only uphold the very principles they espouse when they report on the situation on the ground. In this regard, perhaps it would be useful for the IFJ to send a delegation to Male’.”

Minivan News is currently seeking a response from the IFJ to the Foreign Ministry’s invitation.

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IFJ releases South Asian “Press Freedom in Peril” report

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ)‘s 2011 ‘Press Freedom in Peril‘ for South Asia has claimed there are “several matters of detail on which discord between journalists and the government is rife” in the Maldives.

The report, produced on behalf of the South Asia Media Solidarity Network (SAMSN) of which the Maldives National Journalists’ Association (MJA) is a member, states that “going beyond the perception-based indexes of press freedom that have put Maldives among the most rapidly improving countries, there are certain difficulties that journalists in the nation continue to face, even if these are not reflected in the broad numerical indexes, which are admittedly of limited value.”

The reports claims that journalists covering opposition demonstrations in October 2010 were been “beaten with batons, some of them shackled and a number briefly detained,” with police claiming that this occurred because “some of the journalists covering the demonstration had started engaging them in a confrontational spirit.”

The report also noted the opposition party had blamed the alleged assaults on journalists on Parliamentary Group Leader of the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP), “who had, in the weeks preceding the event, made a number of public statements that suggested a deep antipathy towards the media.”

Manik referred to private TV channels in the Maldives as the fruit of ‘ill-gotten’ wealth and vowed to teach them a lesson,” the report claimed.

Subsequent findings from the Maldives Media Council (MMC) had “sought to be all things to all people, calling on journalists to follow a certain code of practice when covering events such as opposition led demonstrations, while at the same time, reprimanding the police for not giving adequate space for the media in their effort to record the protests.”

“Journalists needed to adhere to a certain standard of discipline, and the police needed to provide sufficient leeway for honest journalistic effort,” the report said, citing the MMC.

Attempts to devise a code of ethics and self-regulation for the country’s journalists by the MJA had been derailed by the state-owned media, the report claimed, “which was indifferent to this initiative, [and] which has rendered the code inoperative.”

The report noted a protest in October where four journalists from the private radio station DhiFM “were compelled to undertake a protest against their own employer when it turned out that the management had revealed the identity of a source used for a report on a tourist resort.”

“Irked by the content of the report, the resort management sacked the employee. The journalists who protested against their management’s unethical decision to reveal the identity of a news source, were in turn fired,” the report noted.

The report also highlighted the arrest of two Haveeru journalists in February 2011 “for interrogation” over leaked pornographic videos obtained from a Facebook blackmailing ring, which reportedly included material involved known public figures, and police efforts to obtain a warrant to search the newspaper’s offices, which was not executed.

A consistent concern throughout the year was the government’s decision to remove all government advertising from the media and publish an official gazette, depriving the industry of income, the report noted.

“By limiting the visibility of government advertisements, it has led to fears of bid-rigging and corruption in the award of official contracts. It has also caused considerable financial distress to the independent media,” the report stated.

The Miadhu newspaper had been compelled to move offices as a result of the decision, it claimed.

Read the full report: Free Speech in Peril: Press Freedom in South Asia 2010-11

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