This Week in Maldives: November 27

Because I’m home alone this week, setting up insane traps and hilarious pranks, and yet no intruders – not even Joe Pesci – turned up 🙁 This edition of This Week in Maldives looks at YAG’s trusty men in the courts and Parliament, and two very confused policemen. 

These are short takes on the headlines of the week gone by.

Court to begin trial on MDP leadership election

Alhan Fahmy wants the court to force MDP to hold an election and choose a new President and VP – asserting that the terms of President Nasheed and party deputy leader Mohamed Shifaz are over.

Now, I honestly don’t know if there’s any merit to Alhan’s case. I’m way more fascinated with Alhan’s strange sense of entitlement to the party’s top position. Why would you want to be the leader of a party where, clearly, nobody likes you?

Just think about it. Alhan once held a public rally, and literally six people showed up. I have had more people show up to my birthday party – and I didn’t even invite anyone! (Also there was no party. And it wasn’t even my birthday)

The last election he contested, he barely managed a double digit vote count in a seat he had previously represented.

And instead of humbly accepting this public drubbing and trying to rebuild his base, he instead goes: ‘Fuck this shit – I’m going to aim for the party’s very top position’

That’s not how it works, Alhan. That’s not how anything works.

Pres Yameen’s faction seeks to postpone local elections

Remember that time you couldn’t study for your calculus paper because the parents were fighting at home, and the school had to reschedule the entire exam until you were ready?

No?

Well, you clearly went to a different school than our esteemed Civil Court justices (At least the ones that went to school)

PPM’s goonda faction has filed a case at the Civil Court pleading that they aren’t sufficiently prepared for the local council elections due to recent infighting within the party. They want the court to postpone the elections by a couple of months.

Instead of laughing the case out of court, the Civil Court justices have already extended the voter-registration deadline indefinitely.

This is either incredibly stupid, or absolute genius. But I should have thought of something like this in school.

Candidates who lose political party primaries barred from contesting in elections

That’s right. If you lose a primary, you immediately forfeit your right to run as an independent, or even on another party’s ticket.

Because.

Maldives.

Criminal Procedure Act implementation delayed by 6 months

Parliament is on a roll!

This piece of legislation supposedly spells out clear procedures to be implemented during criminal trials. Not that any law would ever be enforced under this regime – but I’m actually surprised such a thing actually got approved by YAG’s flunkies in Parliament.

The delay in implementation is not remotely as surprising.

Two policemen arrested over leaflets in police barracks

Two cops were arrested after they allegedly scattered some flyers inside the Iskandhar Koshi police barracks in Malé earlier this month.

The leaflets expressed their disapproval at being forced to attend PPM party rallies, and declared that the Maldives Police Service does not exist to defend the political agenda of the government.

Now hold on right there.

The Maldives Police Service has always existed to defend the regime’s political agenda. Its entire inglorious existence has specifically been about serving this singular purpose. How’d these two gentlemen miss that?

This makes me think these two skipped some classes during their training – specifically the sessions about what the Maldives Police Service actually does.

Being so dead wrong about their own jobs AND littering on campus? That’s a well-deserved jailing.

Police institution not liable for unlawful arrest, high court rules

Former Director of Police Intelligence Sabra Noordeen was picked up from the airport in March 2013 by some individual police officers, and then taken afterward to the said officers’ living room for chit chat.

No wait. She was handcuffed from the airport, taken to the police headquarters, presumably in a police vehicle. She was then accused of inciting violence, and released with an official summons (presumably with some kind of police insignia and stamp) to appear later for questioning.

Two different courts agree that the arrest was unlawful. And yet, the High Court has ruled that the Police institution is not responsible for the unlawful arrest. Only the offending cops were liable in their individual capacity. 

I was a bit confused at first. Are individuals even allowed to arrest people and transport them in police vehicles, except in some official capacity, or serve official papers?

Then I remembered individual police officers could straight up lay siege to the Elections Commission and disrupt entire national elections, as we witnessed later in 2013.

So yeah. I guess this is legit.

Youth Minister claims 75 percent of the Youth Manifesto will be accomplished in mid-2017

What a loser. Meanwhile, the Health Minister has already “delivered 90% of the Health Manifesto” last month. And that one had promises that we actually remember – sea ambulances everywhere, a doctor for each family, unlimited Aasandha public-funded insurance.

And they made this bold “delivered!” claim right before slashing the Aasandha budget by half.

Waheed has a biography

The (immediate past-) President of the Maldives Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik is back. 

The (present immediate-) pain in the ass with a PhD in Cringe Science has stepped out of irrelevance again to promote his (present-continuous-) favourite subject: himself.

Apparently, there’s a new “biography” out on the life of this (pluperfect-subjunctive-) pathetic man who sacrificed the fortunes of a whole country to assuage his over-sized ego and sense of entitlement.

Stories like this have the (interrogative negative-) unfortunate side-effect of reminding me that this man still exists – and remains totally unapologetic.

It ruins my day 5% at at time.

“A person who has lesbian sex wins highest civilian honour in America”, reports VFP

The below “news” headline was published by VFP (Voice of Free Press)

Eh Jinsun Gulhun Hingaa Meehakah America ge Emme Mathee Sharafu https://t.co/QpWDBxeb6v

— VFP (@vfp_mv) November 23, 2016

Here’s the clincher: VFP is a recently formed news website by the team behind CNM – a website that was shut down in an apparent crackdown on the free press.

These reporters then ‘banded together courageously’ – and were last seen carrying placards saying ‘journalism is not a crime’.

But it gets really hard to wholeheartedly defend press freedom when complete knuckleheads have publishing rights on news websites.

Either awful headlines like the above isn’t journalism, or sometimes journalism IS a crime.

Parliament approves bill to impose ADC

The government will now charge an Airport Development Charge (ADC) of $12 and $25 from local and foreign passengers respectively.

This is in addition to an equivalent Airport Service Charge that’s already levied from passengers passing through the country’s primary international airport.

Back in the days of President Nasheed, the INIA airport was seemingly one of the holiest shrines of Islam, and this exact tax was spun as a direct assault on the very heart of the Islamic faith.

However, the faux-outrage machines of mullahs and “nationalists” have long gone silent on the regime. Instead, the fundie fear factories now spend their time on Facebook, once again targeting random bloggers and women who show too much hair.

President authorised to constitute religious advisory body

The 1994 Religious Unity Act was amended this week to allow the president to  appoint a five member “religious advisory” body, that will act as the ultimate arbiter of religious matters in the country.

I was amused to see the reactions to this.

First, dheen-man Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari condemned the government’s “desire to control Islamic teachings”.

DJ Majeed, you may remember, was previously the Minister of Islamic Affairs in Nasheed’s government. Pray what did the Ministry of Islamic Affairs do but ‘control Islamic teachings’?

During his term as the Minister, he had a field day banning DJs and bringing in disreputable characters like Zakir Naik to preach to the public.

Then the spokesman of Adhaalath party, Ali Zahir chimed in, condemning the move as “politically motivated”

Dude. Your party is a politically motivated organization that regularly employs dheen to earn votes. 

(And yet when secular Maldivians say that the state should not have any say in religious matters – these same people tend to disapprove. Strange.)

“Sexually repressed, somewhat perverted ‘journalist’ doesn’t realize Ellen DeGeneres is a globally renowned and accomplished comic, talk show host, writer and actress – not just somebody who has lesbian sex”

Oh. I’m sorry, this wasn’t an actual headline from last week.

But it should have been.