Category: Judiciary

Sharia and the death penalty: how Islamic is ‘marah maru’?

 

Government…can’t be trusted to control its own bureaucrats or collect taxes equitably or fill a pothole, much less decide which of its citizens to kill.

—  Helen Prejean, ‘Dead Man Walking’ 

by Azra Naseem

On July 1, a Maldivian lawyer was brutally murdered, his body stuffed into a dustbin. On June 4,  militant Islamists tried to murder Hilath Rasheed, the country’s only openly gay rights activist and a rare voice advocating secularism in the Maldives. On 30 May,  a 65-year-old man was killed on the island of Manafaru by robbers after his pension fund. On the same day, in Male’ a 16-year-old school boy was stabbed multiple times and left to bleed to death in a public park. On April 1, a 33-year-old man was stabbed to death in broad daylight by two men on a motorbike.  On February 19, a twenty-one-year-old life was taken in a case of ‘mistaken identity’.

Amidst the increasing violence and decreasing value of life, calls for restoration of the death penalty are growing. It is normal for a society experiencing unprecedented levels of crime to demand the death penalty as a solution. In the Maldives, however, the whole debate is framed within the precincts of religion, touted as a return to ‘Islamic justice.’

This is not to say other ways of looking at it are completely absent from the discourse.There’s Hawwa Lubna’s examination of the death penalty within a rule of law framework in Minivan, and Mohamed Visham’s somewhat confused and confusing analysis of its pros and cons in Haveeru, for example. Such discussions are, however, pushed to the fringes as the theme of ‘Islamic justice’ takes precedence.

My question is, how Islamic is this call for ‘Marah Maru’ [death for death]? Is revenge what underpins provisions for the death penalty in Sharia?

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The spy who came in from the coup

by Azra Naseem

Law and order appears to have gone a bit schizophrenic in  the Maldives in the last few days. First the Maldives Police Service (MPS) arrested its intelligence head, Chief Superintendent (MC) Mohamed Hameed, on charges of ‘endangering internal security’ by disclosing classified information.

Hameed is alleged to have co-operated with the co-authors of ‘The Police and Military Coup’, an MDP-affiliated investigation into the events of 7 February 2012. The report was released in response to the current government’s ‘findings’ into the events, published so prematurely as to be available for public feedback even before investigations began.

MPS says drafts of the Coup Report, along with commentary, were found in MC Hameed’s gmail account. (Nobody has yet answered the question of why MPS was snooping around in the man’s private email account in the first place. Is it normal for MPS to spy on their officers?)

Then the Criminal Court granted MPS a five-day extension to Hameed’s detention. He was promptly taken to Dhoonidhoo, Maldives’ most famous prison island.  Hameed’s lawyers lodged an appeal at the High Court on the same day but was not granted a hearing until  the fifth and last day of his detention. Three Justices agreed unanimously that he should be detained for five days, just hours before the five-day detention period expired.

Now, is it just me, or is it a bit difficult to get your head around the question of why the High Court would deign to deliver that judgement at that particular time?  Three more hours, and the detention order would no longer be valid anyway. So what was the eleventh hour High Court ruling for?

The High Court’s behaviour becomes all the more inexplicable in light of the fact that shortly afterwards the Criminal Court released Hameed. It saw no grounds to detain him further. All told, the judiciary does not seem to know quite what to do, with itself or, with a problem like Hameed.

What is to be done with Hameed? Was he ‘spying for the enemy camp’ as some are alleging? Or is he a heroic whistle-blower? Is he to be jailed for life, or celebrated as a voice that stood up for democracy?

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CoNI ‘Timeline’: For your opinion only

by Azra Naseem

The National Commission of Inquiry (CoNI) has not been able to begin its investigations proper yet. But, its Commissioner Ismail Shafeeu and his two ‘investigators’ have seen it fit to release a ‘Timeline’ of events that led to President Mohamed Nasheed’s resignation on 7 February.

The first page is a disclaimer, saying that the released document is ‘not a report of findings’ but a Timeline ‘with omissions’ released to seek public opinion on its contents.

Since when has opinion been needed for the establishment of facts?

And what right does Ismail Shafeeu (the Commissioner) and his two ‘investigators’ have to release anything in the name of CoNI? CoNI is yet to begin its work with the approved MDP nominee (Gaha Ahmed Saeed) and the representative of the international community, yet here it is, a so-called timeline in the name of CoNI.

People are meant to read it and send feedback to CoNI before 21 June.

So here’s an unofficial translation of the 44 page document. See what you make of it, and make sure you leave your opinion. DhivehiSitee will see to it that it gets to CoNI before 21 June.

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