Aishath Velezinee, The Failed Silent Coup: In Defeat, They Reached for the Gun, an insider’s account of how the Maldivian judiciary was hijacked by authoritarian forces to dismantle democratic governance. Download PDF.
by Azra Naseem
Until Dr Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik took oath of office as President of the Maldives on 7 February, most people did not know much about him, and even more could not care less.
The generally shared impression of Waheed was that he is an educated man who drily stuck to policy, the ex-UNICEF man with a PhD from Stanford. As Vice President he was delegated drugs and environment as focus topics, both issues of great national concern. He seemed to keep well out of the political intrigue and chaos that surrounded him; and, unlike most Members of Parliament and the increasing band of petty politicians, largely managed to stay out of newspaper gossip, and the extremely productive Maldivian grapevine.
He has friends in high places, even if of dubious credentials, like the vacillating British tycoon Sir Richard Branson who first criticised Waheed then admired him then suggested a middle-ground; and the mysterious ‘Malaysian consultant’, Dr Ananda Kumarasiri. Kumarasiri is a best-selling Buddhist author who, when he arrived in Male’ shortly after 7 February, was described as ‘a passing friend.’ But he was allowed to interrupt Waheed during an official press conference, and to speak for him in Sri Lanka.
Abroad, the general impression Waheed seems to have left is that of an affable, likeable man. Even when disagreeing with him, Waheed’s foreign acquaintances make a point of saying they like him.
Branson said, for instance:
It was a real pleasure meeting you and your delightful wife when I was last in the Maldives…
From knowing you, I would assume that you were given no choice and that it was through threats that you have ended up in this position.
And Mike Mason, Nasheed’s Energy Advisor, said this:
I don’t think Dr Waheed is a bad man – actually I like him a lot personally.
Perhaps these men see a side of Waheed that the general Maldivian public do not. Certainly, his interactions with the foreign press are rather jovial and quite the opposite of the dull occasions they are back home.
Truth is, the general Maldivian public did not quite know who Dr Waheed was, and nobody really cared. But, now that he has put himself in the Presidential limelight, it is becoming increasingly clear that there is substantial discord between the image people had constructed of Waheed and the details of his personality emerging since he assumed office on 7 February.
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?