Tag: reform

Findings in Huraa drowning investigation revealed to families

The Education Ministry has shared the results of its investigation into the drowning accident in Kaafu atoll Huraa with families of the deceased. The accident left four students and a principal of Hiriya School dead earlier this month.

Details of the investigation have not been released to the public.

The Ministry did issue a statement recommending schools amend their budgets to accommodate a program which would establish safety measures, implement precautionary measures at campsites jointly with relevant authorities, and familiarise management officials and employees with these measures by the end of the year, Haveeru reports.

Police are continuing their investigation of the incident. Sub-Inspector Ahmed Shiyam said investigators are taking care to respect families and friends involved.

“The police are doing a very detailed investigation, and we are respecting the victims’ families, students, teachers and classmates. We have to give them time to recover, so we are not forcing them to participate more than they are willing to at this time,” said Shiyam.

Shiyam said evidence from the site of the incident and nearby Huraa island has been gathered and is being processed. He said the investigation will be done as soon as possible.

Minister Shifa Mohamed, School Board Chairperson, Deputy Education Minister Dr Abdulla Nazeer and Dr Abdul Muhsin Mohamed, who chaired the committee tasked to investigate the accident, also met with the families of the deceased, reports Haveeru. Education Minister Abdullah Nazeer assured the families that the recommended measures would be implemented.

The Education Ministry had not responded to inquiries at time of press.

Nashath Saeed of Meenaz/Gaaf Alif atoll Dhehvadhoo, Mariyam Naaz of Suvaasaage/Haa Alif atoll Hoarafushi, Aishath Shaaniha of Handhuvary Villa/Raa atoll Rasmaadhoo and Mariyam Shaiha of Maafannu Moisha and Principal Ali Nazim drowned during a Fisheries Science field trip to the campsite in Huraa.

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Independent Bodies Committee reviews ACC, JSC, and others

Parliament’s Independent Bodies Committee is reviewing the activities of independent state groups, reports Haveeru. Among the groups reviewed are the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) and the Prosecutor General’s Office.

The committee, chaired by independent MP Mohamed Nasheed, is assessing the challenges to productivity among certain state groups. Nasheed said the committee will also review opportunities for growth.

The committee is said to have found some significant reasons for concern.

Nasheed said these issues would be addressed with budget reform measures and amendments to existing laws.

A report on the committee’s findings is due before parliament in October.

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Government to release full details of economic reform agenda

The government will publicise its entire economic reform agenda at a launch on Monday, President Mohamed Nasheed has said.

Speaking during his weekly radio address, Nasheed downplayed the “unfavourable consequences” of the reforms he said were being predicted by some members of parliament and “a few business associations”, stated that the package of bills would allow further development and promote growth in the Maldives.

Nasheed also noted that 40 convicts had been released under the government’s ‘Second Chance’ program and were currently being rehabilitated. The government is also running a program to train 8500 local workers in various skills, in a bid to combat widespread unemployment, particularly among young people.

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Maldives can learn from Seychelles economic recovery, says President Nasheed

The Maldives can learn from the economic and fiscal reform of the Seychelles in reforming its own stricken economy, President Mohamed Nasheed has said during his visit to the neighbouring island nation.

“Our fishing industry is worth about US$500 million a year. We want to see how we will be able to work with Seychelles on improving on its productivity,” said President Nasheed, following the meeting with his Seychelles counterpart President James Michel.

President Michel said small island states shared many similar challenges, “such as economic development, climate changes, fisheries, tourism, and piracy. We have many commonalities and we share the same ocean. We must do more to improve our regional trade and share our expertise, especially as we are both focused on fisheries and tourism, and in this way develop sustainable solutions to regional challenges,” he said.

The two countries have discussed developing a maritime company in the Maldives, and the possibility of developing a joint airline corporation.

During the delegation’s visit, President Nasheed was briefed by the Governor of the Central Bank of Seychelles, Pierre Laporte, on the economic reform strategies adopted in the Seychelles.

Not far from home

The Seychelles is an upper middle-income country that, like the Maldives, has enjoyed rapid growth led by a tourism sector that, after emerging rise in the 70s, now provides 70 percent of the country’s foreign currency earnings and 30 percent of its employment.

In 2006, the government of the Seychelles allowed its rupee to depreciate after years of allowing it to be overvalued – a similar situation to the Maldives, which earlier this year launched a managed float of the rufiya, within 20 percent of a 12.85 peg, which saw it rocket to the maximum 15.42 where it now remains.

The value of the Seychelles rupee plunged 10 percent in the first nine months of 2007, and the country was subsequently hit by the economic recession and a foreign exchange shortage – another problem familiar to the Maldives. This culminated in a debt crisis in 2008 that threatened the country’s comparatively high standard of living.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) in its country report on the Seychelles (published in January 2011) commented that in the years following 2008, the Seychelles had “achieved a remarkable turnaround of economic policies, including foreign exchange market liberalisation and floating of the rupee” – achievements, the IMF noted, that were “all the more remarkable since the Seychelles had to confront at the same time a global crisis that lowered tourism receipts”.

The IMF’s 2011 report documents the remarkable economic recovery of a small island nation, during a recession affecting its core business. In particular, the report praised the Seychelles for renewing the confidence of private investors, “which translated into increased foreign direct investment to develop the islands’ exceptional tourism potential”, the stabilisation of the exchange rate, price stability, and the rebuilding of reserves “which offer room for more expansionary policies.”

Prior to 2008, the Seychelle’s overall deficit had reached 9.8 percent and the country was facing “an acute balance of payments” as public debt was predicted to rise a further 20 percent in two years. Ratings agency Standard & Poor – which this week lowered the credit rating of the US for the first time in history – had downgraded the Seychelles to “selective default”.

Several attempts to increase the value of the rupee against the US dollar had been unsuccessful, and did little to address the country’s foreign currency shortage – at the beginning of 2007, the rupee was officially valued at 6 to the US dollar, while the blackmarket exchange rate sat at almost double.

In late 2007 the government of the Seychelles devalued the rupee, setting the official exchange rate to 8 rupees to the US dollar. As in the Maldives following the government’s effective devaluation of the rufiyaa from 12.85 to 15.42 to the US dollar via a ‘managed’ float, the blackmarket in the Seychelles simply adjusted for the increase, settling at 13-14 rupees to the dollar.

In November 2008, the government of the Seychelles dropped its peg and floated the rupee against the US dollar. The rupee immediately leapt to almost 18, and remained substantially volatile for much of the next year. By late 2009 it had plunged to 10 rupees against the dollar, and a year later had settled around 12, where it remains.

Despite several concerns about the lack of diversification of the economy and the impact of piracy – the Seychelles coastguard rescued 27 hostages in March last year after firing 10,000 12.7mm rounds at the engine of the pirate vessel – the IMF describes the outlook for the Seychelles as favourable and predicts medium term growth of five percent as the country’s tourism industry expands and promotes itself outside traditional markets.

“The Seychelles’s stabilisation success offers perspectives for a less painful path toward fiscal sustainability, but caution is needed to maintain external stability and growth prospects,” the IMF noted.

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Parliament falling short of public expectations despite work rate, says Speaker Shahid

Parliamentary Speaker Abdulla Shahid believes the People’s Majlis has had success in passing legislation, at least statistically, yet he concedes parliament has still failed to meet the public’s expectations in terms of its conduct.

Speaking to Minivan News, Shahid – a member of the opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) – claimed that since constitutional amendments were introduced in 2008 to try and transform parliament from a “ceremonial” institution to a functioning national body, vital regulation was beginning to be passed.  He conceded though that changes were not necessarily occurring in line with public sentiment.

“The three branches of government are trying to deal with a situation where, as in any transition, the expectations of the public are at a very high level. When you have a new democracy come in, citizens will be wanting things to change overnight. [These expectations] have been seen in many countries,” the Speaker said.   “The challenges that we have here – with the judiciary and parliament – are not because we are unable to perform, but that we are unable to perform to the expectations of the people.”

Shahid said that after living for decades under a non-democratic system, he believed peoples’ demands for political reform have been “suppressed” for such a long period of time that their sudden release created a “huge burst” of energy to ensure change that the Majlis was not always succeeding in providing.

“These expectations have been let out, so the public wants changes not today or tomorrow, but amendments that should have perhaps occurred yesterday and the day before,” he claimed, adding that parliament has in recent years undertaken a much more prolific workload regards to passing legislation.

However, Shahid, who is also a member of the opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP), stressed that he was optimistic that, despite recent criticisms of judicial reform and even government economic policy, parliament would be able to catch up in meeting these expectations.

“To give a feel of how much work has been done in the parliament, when you look at the statistics, in 2000 for example, there were four bills submitted to the parliament and these were all completed. In 2001, seven bills were submitted and two of them were completed. In 2004, eight were submitted, four were completed,” he said.

By 2005, Shahid added that official statistics showed 17 bills were proposed and five were completed, followed a year later by another five bills being completed from a total number of 30 that were put forward.  The Speaker claimed that there was limited media experience among the various outlets to detail the work being conducted in parliament.

“No one was talking to the public that 30 bills had been submitted to parliament and only five were completed. No one was talking about this,” he said.

By 2008 – the year that the current Maldivian constitution was put in place -the same parliament-supplied figures showed that out of a total of 25 bills submitted, 15 were put into practice.

By the formation of the currently serving 17th national parliament in May 2009, Shahid said that over the second half of the year, a total of 55 bills, including a number of outstanding pieces of legislation, were all passed.

“The government sent everything back, they just changed the covering note and submitted it, so 55 bills were passed. That year, when the 17th parliament came in with the new constitution, we were faced with the challenge of devising the standing orders and the broader mandate of how to cope with the constitution,” he said. “When the constitution was drafted and adapted, there was no work done to get [parliament] to catch up with constitutional demands. The [Majlis] was just as it was in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. It was just a ceremonial set up here. But the new constitution demanded more constructive development needed to be done.”

As a result of trying to implement these changes, by last year Shahid said that the statistics showed 42 bills had been passed out of a total of 52 submitted.

Amidst this seeming rise in the output of parliament during recent years, the parliamentary speaker said that private and public media, as well as new rights protecting freedom of expression in the country, were responsible for furthering debate between people over whether parliament was functioning properly.

However, the Speaker accepted that subjects such as outlining a clear and clarified penal code, as well as an Evidence Bill to support judicial reform and policing, partisan behaviour between rival parties within the Majlis was creating the impression that there was no interest in having such bills passed.

In order to facilitate a faster moving reform of criminal legislation, Shahid claimed that talks had been opened between the various political stakeholders required to finalise any agreements.

“I met with party leaders and also the chair of all the committees yesterday. There is the general desire amongst the leadership to find ways of increasing the productivity rate of the house. We feel even though we continue to do work ahead of what any other parliament had done, still we are far behind in meeting the public’s expectations,” he said. “The reality is that we need to meet these public expectations. The committee chairs have given me an agreement that they will try and finds ways of fast tracking many of the bills, while political parties supplied an agreement that on issues on which they may disagree, they will endeavour to deal with the technical and more mundane bills faster.”

Aside from MPs working along partisan lines, Shahid said that the issue of language was another significant challenge for MPs to overcome, especially in translating very technical proposals relating to legal definitions into Dhivehi from other languages. While other Commonwealth countries were able to take existing legislation and adapt the document accordingly, the Speaker took the example of the Penal Code. In its original English draft, put together by Professor Paul Robinson at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, the code was said to have perfect sense, yet the Speaker said it did not translate directly into the Dhivehi language.

In the previous parliament, Shahid said that the question had therefore arisen as to whether the text should be adopted as it was or be amended.

“If we adopt something that we ourselves [parliament] can’t make sense of, can the Appeal Court, which is going to punish the average person on the street, use it?”

Under the current parliament, a committee was now said to be reviewing every individual article in the document to ensure it was to the satisfaction of parliamentarians.

Shahid added that similar issues had also been raised in relation to an evidence bill that had been adapted, originally from a Malaysian document.

With the bills now in the process of engagement with the Attorney General and Prosecutor General’s office, both of which the speaker acknowledged parliament had not had “the best of relationships with” during the previous year, there was optimism they could be passed.

“The Attorney General has taken the bill back for redrafting and I understand that it will be submitted back to the committee very soon,” he said. “The process of ‘throwing it out’ or rejecting the bill has not taken place because if we reject the bill, then the message again to the public is mixed: ‘We don’t want the evidence bill’. This is the message if we reject it, but if we accept the bill and approve it, along with the assistance and cooperation of the government and then submit it, then the process is starting to move.”

Shahid claimed he had already seen more engagement between the executive and parliament and was confident the bills would be passed.

Not all of the proposals put before parliament, have been welcomed by the public though. This has been seen, perhaps most noticeably, in the Privileges Bill that led to protests outside the Majlis at the end of last year to try and highlight public dissatisfaction with proposed pay rises and other benefits for MPs.

Although the speaker said that he believed there were “issues” with the Privileges Bill, he claimed these did not detract from its importance for both MPs and judges.

“The members of parliament have certain functions entrusted by the people who elected them. For example the privileges bill in many countries would give the right for the MP to have the right access to parliament. So he cannot be arrested on his way to the parliament for certain offences,” he said. “If there is an important vote in the parliament and the MP is on his way, say there is a narrow margin and the guy gets stopped for traffic offences. The constitution allows him to be held in custody for 24 hours and the vote is then done. I’m not saying that the current government would act like this, but what if we have a government that would?”

The Speaker took the example of the drafting of the new constitution and electing a Speaker for the constitutional assembly back in 2004 as an indication of what could happen.

“One just needs to find out how many members were included when they elected a Speaker. So thinking that the current government would [not act this way] just because of journalists is not right. We have to have the rights of MPs to defend the constitution described in the bill,” he said. “I do not agree with the tax free cars for the members for parliament and I do not agree with many other things, but the international standards have to be respected.”

The bill has recently been returned by the president to be redrafted, with Shahid claiming that he has recommended that they be sent to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association in order to be adapted in line with international standards.

When dealing with public perceptions of parliamentarians, particularly with how they are dealt within the media, the parliamentary speaker said that he believed in light of recent, yet rare controversies surrounding journalists being summoned before the Majlis, politicians needed to adapt their attitudes rather than restricting media coverage.

Local media bodies like the Maldives Journalist Association (MJA) hit out at the Majlis earlier this month after parliament cut a live feed to private radio station DhiFM and ordered two of its reporters before a committee over allegations it was in contempt.

No clarification has been given over the exact offense caused during an edition of the broadcaster’s “Breakfast Club” show, though Shahid said he agreed that occasional suggestions of media censorship in the Majlis should be opposed to prevent creating a fear of using free speech.

“I think because we are at the infant stage of democracy, we need the public and especially politicians to develop a thick skin. Because we are public figures, of course we will be attacked and scrutinised – that is the beauty of democracy,” he said. “If you do something right or do something wrong they will talk about you. That is what has happened.”

In addressing media conduct, the speaker said that after years of being restricted or “guided”, journalists had now been “let loose”, yet there was no indication of how many trained reporters were currently operating in the country.

“What I know is that the institutions that are supposed to be regulating or promoting independent media have still not started functioning,” he said.

Shahid claimed that any restrictions emplaced on the media would be a step in the wrong direction for democracy and ensuring people had the right to express thoughts and discuss them – even when this may difficult for the population at large.

The speaker claimed that if a culture developed where MPs resorted en masse to take up litigation against journalists and commentators, then freedoms that had been won in the Maldives would in essence, be retracted.

“My vision is that five years, 10 years, 15 years from now, we will be developed. Our minds, the minds of our children, will be more developed and more tolerant. I have experienced this when we began parliament,” he claimed. “In 2009, when the 17th parliament was formed, the first day the amount of abuse I got as a Speaker on the floor itself was tremendous. A lot of people asked why I took it. But I firmly believed we had a young and new group of people becoming parliamentarians and they hadn’t had experience.”

However, the Speaker said he believed that a lot of members had now grown and learnt to be more responsible parliamentarians, even despite occasions where tempers flared.

Shahid said that the scale of changes within society, as well as the nation’s parliamentary system should not be underestimated though; claiming that the two years that have passed since the current constitution has come into place was still too short a period of time to expect a total democratic transition.

“Things have changed, on paper, overnight. But up here, mentally, are we prepared? Are we able to cope with the change?” he asked. “I firmly believe that if we are able to sustain and consolidate the situation, ultimately, the desired democratic system will be in place. But we have to be very careful not to let the public trust deteriorate to a level whereby the entire system fails and we again slide back into dictatorship.”

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President Obama signs financial reform bill

“The toughest set of Wall Street regulations and consumer protections against greedy financial practices since the Great Depression” has been signed into law by President Obama, writes Kenneth Bazinet for the New York Daily News.

The new rules will “ensure that it is more profitable to play by the rules than to game the system,” says President Obama.

Read more

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Government investigates accused MPs’ “dark and evil schemes”, while UK issues travel advisory

The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has issued a travel warning for the Maldives following recent political turmoil in the country, urging caution around “large political gatherings”, while debate on the political deadlock has spread to the House of Lords in the UK Parliament.

During Question Time, the UK Labour Party’s Lord Foulkes expressed “disappointment that President Nasheed seems to be reverting to the bad habits of his predecessor”, following the detention of People’s Alliance (PA) MP Abdulla Yameen, and urged the government to pressure the Maldives to restore “democratic freedoms”.

Conservative Lord Howell, also State Minister for the FCO, responded that the government was “pursuing full encouragement through our high commission in Colombo and other means to ensure that democratic development continues.”

Nasheed’s restoration of his cabinet ministers was “a step forward”, Howell promised.

Conservative Lord Naseby pointed out that the Maldives “is no longer a protectorate of the United Kingdom… and that being the situation, what role do we have at all to interfere in what is in fact the Maldivian exercise of democracy as they interpret it?”

Yameen meanwhile remains in MNDF custody on the Presidential Retreat ‘Aarah’, although appears free to communicate with the media given that Minivan News was able to contact him yesterday.

The Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) – and the government – insist that the MP and high-profile businessman is under ‘protective’ custody after demonstrations outside his home last week turned violent.

Yameen has told local media he does not wish to be detained in ‘protective’ custody. The MNDF have also refused to present him before the court on a court order, raising some international eyebrows.

The President’s Press Secretary Mohamed Zuhair stuck to that story, insisting Yameen was being “protected” rather than “detained”.

Zuhair also claimed Yameen’s custodial protection was not unconstitutional, as the opposition has claimed, although Minivan News is still awaiting clarification from government lawyers as to how this is so.

“The MNDF is working absolutely within the constitution,” Zuhair said. “Yameen is being held by the MNDF, not the government. If Yameen is concerned about this he will be able to challenge it in court.”

“Dark and evil schemes”

Beyond the debate over Yameen’s detention, and recent court cases concerning the legality of his arrest along with that of Jumhoree Party (JP) leader Gasim Ibrahim, Zuhair said that given the severity of the allegations against them, neither could be considered prisoners of conscience.

“I cannot describe these people as political leaders – they are accused of high crimes and plots against the state,” Zuhair said.

“These MPs are two individuals of high net worth – tycoons with vested interests,” he explained. “In pursuing their business interests they became enormously rich during the previous regime, and now they are trying to use their ill-gotten gains to bribe members in the Majlis and judiciary to keep themselves in power and above the fray.”

“They were up to all sorts of dark and evil schemes,” Zuhair alleged. “There were plans afoot to topple the government illegally before the interim period was over.”

Zuhair explained that the government felt obliged to take action after six MDP MPs came forward with statements alleging Yameen and Gasim had attempted to bribe them to vote against the government.

The opposition PA-DRP coalition already has a small voting majority, with the addition of supportive independent MPs, however certain votes require a two-thirds majority of the 77 member chamber – such as a no-confidence motion to impeach the president or vice-president.

“In one incident early on in this administration, following the President’s return from Italy, they set up a telephone and a video camera in a committee room in parliament, brought a judge to sit in, and then tried to get two members of the president’s delegation swear on the Qur’an under oath that the President was drinking alcohol,” Zuhair observed.

The privatisation of Male’ International airport had clashed with the vested interests of the accused MPs, Zuhair claimed, sparking the current political debacle.

“Gasim was concerned the new airport might take the charter flights he had intended would be landing at the new airport he is building in Maamagilli,” Zuhair alleged, “while Yameen is a third party supplier of fuel at Male International Airport through the Maldives National Oil Company, which has representation in Singapore.”

The fuel trade is the most immediately lucrative part of the airport deal, Minivan News understands, and is a key reason behind both GMR’s interest and the government’s decision to award the contract to the Indian infrastructure giant. GMR has told Minivan News it will amalgamate the trade under one umbrella, a decision that will likely affect current third party suppliers.

Meanwhile Opposition DQP leader Hassan Saeed, who opposed the airport privatisation and is currently lobbying in the UK for international support for Yameen’s release, “is receiving huge legal fees from both Yameen and Gasim,” Zuhair claimed.

NGOs speak

A coalition of NGOs including Madulu, the Maldivian Democracy Network, Huvadhoo Aid, Transparency Maldives, Maldives Youth Action Network, HAND and Democracy House, meanwhile issued a statement “categorically denouncing the undemocratic actions of the three Powers of the State, at a time when democracy is in its infant stages in the Maldives.”

“We believe recent political and civil unrest is a consequence of these three arms of the State disregarding the spirit of the Maldivian Constitution,” the NGOs said. “We believe a culture of manipulation of the law to infringe upon the rights of one another has developed and that the three arms of the State have failed to give each other due respect.”

“It is not responsible on the part of the parliament, that they should pass laws that undermine the powers of the executive.

“It is unacceptable that the executive, should use its powers to harass and deter the functioning of the parliament, to disrepute the judiciary and to try to exert undue influence on the judicial system.

“The lack of consistency in the rulings of the courts, and actions which undermine the trust of the people in the judicial system are contrary to the high standards which are expected of Judges. We call upon the judiciary to work to restore the people’s faith in the judicial system.

The NGOs added that “other concerned State institutions” have also failed to “give due regard to the situation” and have acted irresponsibly.

The coalition also urged political parties to refrain from bringing violence to the streets, but condemned the security forces “for stepping outside the boundaries of the law with regards to arrest and detention” and the recent distribution of private telephone conversations by the media containing implications of corruption behaviour among MPs.

Between a rock and the Maldives

The government well aware of its status as international darling on climate change, but Nasheed appears willing to risk international censure for the sake of isolating Yameen while the state accumulates evidence in the background. Police were preparing to “make a splash” on the subject, Zuhair hinted.

However even if this evidence is obtained, demands from the international community – and opposition – that the government respect the rule of law and the judicial system, mean the government is faced with the new problem of legitimising its case against the businessmen and opposition leaders, now that allegations of obstruction have been levelled at the judiciary – including, yesterday, from the police themselves.

The government has been urging public respect for the judicial system – and the President’s Political Advisor Hassan Afeef has stated that the government will abide by any rulings from the Supreme Court.

The Judicial Services Commission (JSC), tasked with reforming the judicial system, has three sitting judges as members and vested interests, according to the President’s outspoken member on the commission, Aishath Velezinee.

“Of the 207 of the judges currently in office, 39 have degrees or higher. Some left school before grade seven, meaning they haven’t completed primary school,” Velezinee noted.

In addition there are seven sitting judges found guilty of a criminal breach of trust; five with allegations of a criminal breach of trust; two being prosecuted for an alleged breach of trust; one on trial for sexual misconduct; two have been found guilty of sexual misconduct; one was found guilty for an offence which had a prescribed punishment in Islam; and another who has both been accused of a criminal breach of trust, and found guilty of sexual misconduct – a total of 19 with documented criminal history.

Behind the scenes the executive is racing to nominate new judges before the interim period concludes on August 7, when sitting judges are granted automatic tenure.

However nominations for any new judges will have to be approved by the Majlis, which was cancelled this morning on points of order that developed into a scuffle outside.

“[The MPs] are trying to derail the process,” suggested Zuhair. “They are also panicking because they have no way of knowing who is going to be [implicated] by these corruption charges.”

As for tourists reading the today’s travel advisory urging caution in the capital, Zuhair observed that they “should be happier to know the top dollars they are paying are not being used for corrupt purposes.”

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