Maldives parliament speaker to face no-confidence vote

Mohamed Nasheed was one of the founders of the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) along with the country’s current president Ibrahim Mohamed Salih. In 2008 the country amended its constitution to allow multi-party democracy under which the first election was held the same year. The largest opposition party won the election and Nasheed became the president of Maldives.

In 2012 many citizens took the streets to protest against Mohamed Nasheed who soon led to large public uprising. Citizens accused his economic policy being short-sighted as many government owned companies were planned to be privatized. One was the country’s main international airport that was among the highest source of foreign country to the government. Under Nasheed’s privatization policy the GMR group of India took over management of the airport. The public company had published their financial statements on their website showing performance of the Maldives airport among the revenue generators. Nasheed was also accused of involving India too much in its foreign policy at a time India was actively seeking to spread influence in the region.

The public also accused  Nasheed of being pro-Israel in his foreign under. Maldives and Israel had no political relations. Even the Maldives passport said “valid in all countries except Israel”. Due to occupation of Palestine land by Israel, and continuous torture and terrorism by the Israel, the Maldives public strong oppose relations with Israel. Despite that, Nasheed allowed Eye From Zion, an Israeli non-profit to visit Maldives and conduct eye camps in capital city. Many citizens were angry for improving tie with Israel. Citizens expressed their concerns on social media saying that Palestine is in more need for these eye camps due to torture by Israeli armed forces.

Nasheed also failed to maintain law and order in the country. All of these finally led to his resignation in 2012. Right after resigning he claimed he was forced to do so at gun point but was quickly ruled out by the public as it was shown live on national television. During the resignation Nasheed also delivered a television address and mentioned that he was resigning. So, Nasheed’s claim of forced resignation did not gain credibility and MDP’s protests to regain power was quickly managed by the law enforcement authorities. Nasheed and MDP had no other choice but accept the fate of his actions. Following his resignation the Vice President took oath to office and ruled the country until next election.

In 2013 there was the presidential election which was won by PPM lead by Abdulla Yameen. Nasheed and MDP waited for another 5 years. In 2018 there was an opposition coalition lead by MDP and won the election. MDP’s candidate Ibrahim Mohamed Salih became the country’s president and political positions were distributed among the coalition partners. Mohamed Nasheed secured a seat in parliament and became its speaker.

Currently the presidential election is planned to take place later this year. Ruling party’s current president Solih and ex-president Nasheed have now entered into a conflict and party is heading to division.

Under the party’s policy a primary was conducted earlier this year to select a presidential candidate. Solih and Nasheed, along with some other candidates, competed for the official presidential ticket of the party. Salih won more than half of the votes and secured the ticket. Nasheed reacted sarcastically and thereafter many incidents took place leading to divisions within the party.

Parliamentary Member that were local to Nasheed recently submitted documents to form a new political party called The Democrats. Nasheed is still, on official records, a member of MDP even though it is apparent that the new party in formation stage is backed by Nasheed. He has recently expressed his interest to merge both parties and regain control of MDP by Nasheed, but how he interests do that is unknown.

Parliamentarians of ruling MDP have recently submitted documents to remove Nasheed from the position of Speaker. Vice Speaker of Parliament is also under no-confidence vote which is yet to happen. Both of them belong to same political clan. These are some serious setbacks to Mohamed Nasheed and his political career which has been on a landslide since is resignation in 2012. His only again in politics ever since was the win on parliamentary election which enabled him to remain in political climate despite being strengthless.