Category: People

Why we must object to the farce of a ‘trial’ against Nasheed

by Aishath Velezinee

On Sunday, former President of Maldives, Mohamed Nasheed, was arrested. The arrest warrant issued by Criminal Court stated “terrorism charges brought against the subject and fears that he may not attend the Court or go into hiding” as reason for arrest. The evidence and substantiation for Court decision was given as, “how matters had transpired when a case against subject was heard at the Hulhumale’ Magistrate Court, and Police Intelligence reports”. The arrest warrant was provided on the request of the Prosecutor General who was according to the arrest warrant, “investigating case”.

Till then, there had been no mention of terrorism charges against Nasheed by any authority nor had an investigation into terrorist activities by Nasheed taken place.

Local media soon reported the trial has been scheduled in Criminal Court for 4pm today, and it emerged that the Prosecutor General had filed new terrorism charges in Criminal Court after withdrawing the case against Nasheed pending in Hulhumale’ Magistrate Court for over two years as Nasheed challenged the cherrypicking of his trial bench by the Judicial Service Commssion and the procedural appeals dragged on without decision.

As the new trial begins in a couple of hours, there is more reason than ever before to object to the farce.

  1. The current Prosecutor General Muhthaz Muhsin is a former Criminal Court judge, who worked as a junior judge under Criminal Court chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed who is himself the subject in the case against Nasheed.
  1. Media reports the Criminal Court has selected a bench of three judges – Judge Abdulla Didi, Judge Ahmed Rasheed and Judge Shujau Usman – for the case.

The first two are both former members of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) who played crucial roles within JSC in both re-appointing Abdulla Mohamed as judge despite him not meeting criteria and pending serious misconduct issues, and in covering up misconduct after re-appointment. Moreover, both carry bias against Nasheed evident in JSC records, especially in discussions of misconduct allegations against Judge Abdulla Mohamed filed with the JSC by the President’s Office in 2009 when Nasheed was in office.

Judge Didi served on the JSC from it’s establishment as an interim commission in 2008 till 2015 as the lower courts appointee. Ahmed Rasheed elected by the law community served on the JSC from 2009 to 2015 and was appointed a Criminal Court judge by the JSC just days ago.

The third, Shujau Usman, was re-appointed a Magistrate by JSC despite a criminal record and was one of three magistrates cherry-picked by the JSC for the Hulhumale’ Magistrate Court bench for Nasheed’s case.

Nasheed’s trial then is not simply political persecution by the government of President Yameen but an already orchestrated trial, managed by the JSC, with the Prosecutor General and the Criminal Court bench already set against Nasheed and ready to avenge Abdulla Mohamed.

Meanwhile, heading the JSC today is Supreme Court Justice Ali Hameed infamous for his white underpants and sex tapes gone viral on the internet.

Like Water for Politics: Lessons from Male’ Water Crisis

YameenWater

by Azra Naseem

On 4 December, a fire at the Male’ Water and Sewerage Company (MWSC) damaged the desalination plants supplying water to the congested capital’s 150,000 residents. Since then the two square kilometre island has been without running water. Drinking water has never really been free in the Maldives. A majority choose to buy bottled water rather than drink desalinated tap water. Soon after the fire at the MWSC, the island was on the verge of running out of bottled water, too, as people started panic buying in bulk.

Foreign Minister Dunya Maumoon asked for foreign assistance later the same evening. India was the first to respond. The first Indian aircraft carrying emergency water assistance for residents of Male’ arrived on the morning of 5 December. On Sunday, INS Deepak docked in Male’. She was carrying 900 tonnes of water, and has the capacity to produce 200 tonnes a day. Sri Lanka also sent water, and US agreed to help. 20 tonnes of water from China arrived Sunday night by air, and another 600 tonnes arrived this morning with the Chinese navy. As the newly set up [second] official Twitter account of the Maldives Ministry of Foreign Affairs shows, plenty more water has been shipped to Male’ in-between. Police and army are distributing the water from designated points, and people are queuing up in tens of thousands to collect it during specified times—it is all they have for drinking, cooking and all sanitary purposes.

The crisis has revealed the MWSC—co-owned by the Maldives government (80%) and Japan’s Hitachi company (20%)—does not have a back-up plan for supplying water to Male’s residents. As any major crisis in a country tends to do, Male’s water crisis has also revealed interesting facts about its socio-economic and political life.

Socially, the first day of free water distribution was marred by racism as some residents of Male’ tried to stop expatriate labourers from getting to the rationed water. The shameful behaviour even made it on to Al Jazeera. Sadly, it’s not a once-off. Discrimination against (non-white) immigrants is one of the defining characteristics of Male’ today. Often, Bangladeshis are at the receiving end of this racism. On Monday a naval vessel, BNS Samudra Joy, carrying 100,000 tonnes of drinking water and five mobile water treatment plants docked in Male. In addition to appreciating the water, many also admired the Bangladeshi gesture as a great way of raising the middle finger to Maldivian discrimination against their workers in Male’.

There have also been many reports the foreign donated water is not being distributed equally.

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One hundred days of sorrow: missing moyameehaa

“You run back and forth listening for unusual events,
peering into the faces of travelers.
“Why are you looking at me like a madman?”
I have lost a friend. Please forgive me.” – Rumi

Rilwan

by Azra Naseem

Sunday will be the 100th day since Ahmed Rizwan (Rilwan) Abdulla, @moyameehaa, was abducted. Time has dragged, weighted down by the burden of not knowing. Between then and now much, yet nothing, has happened. The posters brightening a thousand walls with Rilwan’s smile have faded with the sun and dissolved with the rain. Five thousand men and women put pen to paper, ‘Good Sir, kind Madam, please find Rilwan,’ they begged. At least as many thousand Tweets have echoed round the world: ‘#Findmoyameehaa, #Findoyameehaa.’ Hundreds of friends and supporters have marched on Male’s streets with the question: ‘Where is Rilwan?’ Scores have met many miles away in Melbourne and in New York, asking the same question.

Rilwan’s mother has said, to any ears that would listen, ‘I am poor, but my love makes Rilwan a priceless treasure. Please find him for me.’ Hundreds have felt her tears roll down their faces. ‘He is alive,’ Rilwan’s father has insisted. His mind has been far from the assorted fruits and vegetables he sells at the local market. ‘How do you know?’ ask customers who have stopped to listen. Without batting an eyelid he has said, ‘I asked a clairvoyant.’

It may seem odd, approaching a clairvoyant to look for a son abducted in this technologically advanced twenty first century. But when the natural world makes no sense, the supernatural often appears the only consolation. In its investigation into Rilwan’s disappearance, Maldives Police Service (MPS) has been more than negligent; it has been willfully perverse. In hundred days the MPS has given almost as many excuses for making zero progress in the search for Rilwan: nobody was abducted; it was a woman who was abducted; it was not an abduction, it was a rape; Rilwan ‘disappeared himself’; Rilwan is an apostate, not worth looking for; Rilwan is playing an elaborate joke; Rilwan is writing his own missing persons reports; Rilwan was abducted by gangs, there are no gangs in the Maldives; we have arrested someone, we have let him go; Rilwan was abducted by violent extremists, there are no violent extremists in the Maldives; Rilwan is not missing, it is all a political drama; no comment; Rilwan who?

Rilwan the journalist who examined the many maladies of Maldives. Rilwan the teenage blogger who gave a damn about the poor and the wronged. Rilwan the ex-radical who understood the extremist mindset better than all official strategists. Rilwan the story-teller whose #FerryTales shortened the distance between Male’ and Hulhumale’ more than any bridge can. Rilwan the well-mannered young man who respected the elderly. Rilwan the friend who listened. Rilwan the writer who inspired. Rilwan the aspiring poet who read Rumi and Neruda. Rilwan the thinker who sought spiritual succor in meditation, Nusrat Fatah Khan and the Quran. Rilwan the friend who laughed; the brother who baked; the uncle who played; the son who loved. Rilwan the Maldivian who cared.

The reasons why Rilwan’s friends, family and supporters want him found are the very reason the authorities want him to remain missing. What Rilwan abhorred in our society, our rulers cheer loudly.

Rilwan wanted a society free of corruption; our leaders revel in it. He wanted to see Jihadist ideologies become less attractive to young Maldivians; our religious clerics encourage it while the government turns a blind eye. He wanted gang violence to have less power over society; senior government officials outsource authority to favoured gang members. Rilwan wanted equal justice for all; our rulers want judgement and punishment to be arbitrary, wielded by them how and when they please. He wanted a society where citizens shared its wealth more equally; our rulers want all wealth to be their own.

Rilwan wanted us all to think more deeply about how to live a more meaningful, spiritual and equal existence; it is the antithesis of all that our rulers desire. For the moment we begin to think more deeply is the moment we begin to regret voting them in. It would be the beginning of our demand for change, the precursor to saying: ‘Enough. I will not let you rule me anymore.’

If the past 100 days has made anything clear, it is that this government will do all it can to stop Rilwan from being found. It is in its interests to do so. The past 100 days has also made something else very clear: we must do all we can to find out what happened to Rilwan. It is in our interests to do so. Our pursuit of a more just, equal and democratic society, as dreamed of by Rilwan, cannot begin if we forget Rilwan’s abduction and the government’s role in it, either by taking him or covering it up.

Let’s not stop our pressure on the authorities to #FindMoyameehaa. We owe it to Rilwan, and to our future.