Disobedient Writer. Occasional satirist.
Comments on society and politics in Maldives.
Maldives Home Minister Umar Naseer is confident that he can win at the Olympic 100m hurdles. He just needs some slight change of rules – firstly, to remove those annoying barriers that get in the way. Having to jump over these numerous obstacles were clearly undermining his goal of completing the race, he noticed. He […]
The streets of Malé have seen a lot of spilled blood and brain matter in recent weeks – as Maldives spirals downwards rapidly, with an anti-democratic regime at the helm. MvMurders.com is an initiative to document and track violent murders in the Maldives Azra Naseem writes on the subject: “In the early hours of this […]
I remember the exact moment when I first saw Ahmed Rilwan. It was late 2009, and I had just arrived in the Maldives. Some bloggers had gotten together to sort of welcome me and get introduced. We were sitting in a sea-side café at night, when he walked in with two other well known bloggers. We hit […]
The Poster Seller I was still in school, maybe in the sixth grade. My sister was three years my senior. At the time we were living in Trivandrum, in this two-storeyed house just off a narrow street. Right from when I could first remember, there would come to our place a man who sold posters for […]
A Maldivian hero has been abducted. A lover of history, Maldivian culture, poetry, folklore and humour. A writer, a journalist, an irreplaceable friend. An irrepressible advocate of human rights, and a stubborn enemy of injustice.One of the earliest, and most popular online bloggers in the Maldives. An entertaining, informative online personality. An endless reservoir of […]
As a blogger, I write words and publish them online. Sometimes it is a mildly humorous piece, sometimes it is an angry rant. Sometimes I churn out 1500 word essays where I explore some boring subject in annoying detail. When I write, my objective is sometimes to persuade the reader. Other times it is to […]
I remember ruffling some feathers a few years ago, when I publicly defended the Maldivian government’s decision to resume diplomatic relations with the state of Israel. My reasoning back then was basically this: Israel had done no harm to the Maldives or Dhivehin Maldives, as a sovereign, independent state, needed to maintain an independent foreign […]
Here’s the full story on the latest cycle of violence, kidnapping and appalling ass-hattery that passes off for “Islam” these days in the Maldives. Apparently, if the Prophet were alive today, he’d be stalking people on Facebook, and leading a gang of petty hoodlums to kidnap, harass and torture young people off the street. This […]
Another day. Another dead baby. It is incredibly painful to read about tiny lives, snuffed out prematurely in horrifying ways. Maldivians too easily – and too often – dismiss the creeping social rigidity and harsh moral codes of the current Wahhabi onslaught. But these tiny bodies discarded in tin cans and duffel bags are direct […]
I just read a piece in the Dhaka Tribune by Prof. Selina Mohsin, the former Bangladeshi High Commissioner to Maldives, about the plight of migrant Bangladeshi workers in the Maldives. Most of the information was not new to me; there is a reason why the Maldives has consistently been placed on the US State Department’s […]
This Week in Maldives: January 8
Because you guys liked, RT’d and shared the hell out of the last edition, this week I focus on aqeeda-endangering textbooks, Dunya’s return to the dark side, and Muizzu engaged in a series of unfortunate Muizzed up things. These are short takes on the headlines of the week gone by. Dunya rejoins the regime Dunya […]
Dhoonidhoo Diaries: Part 3 – Heat and Captivity
This is the third instalment in the Dhoonidhoo Diaries series where I pen down my experiences in Dhoonidhoo prison where I was incarcerated following an unprecedented regime crackdown on the May Day rally. Read Part 1 here and Part 2 here. Nearly 200 democratic protesters were arrested on 1st May 2015 by the Maldives’ authoritarian […]
Dhoonidhoo Diaries: Part 2 – Prison Cell
1st May 2015 saw the largest anti-government protests in Maldivian history, with nearly 20,000 protesters filling the main thoroughfare in Malé. I was among the nearly 200 democratic protesters arrested that day, in the largest police crackdown in over a decade. I was released after being held for 21 days without trial. But several May […]
Dhoonidhoo Diaries: Part 1 – Arrest and Incarceration
1st May 2015 saw the largest anti-government protests in Maldivian history, with nearly 20,000 protesters filling the main thoroughfare in Malé. It also saw the largest police crackdown in over a decade, with nearly 200 democratic protesters arrested. I was among those arrested, and was held captive for 21 days, including 5 days of house […]
I remember the exact moment when I first saw Ahmed Rilwan. It was late 2009, and I had just arrived in the Maldives. Some bloggers had gotten together to sort of welcome me and get introduced. We were sitting in a sea-side café at night, when he walked in with two other well known bloggers. We hit […]
Connect