In a none-too-surprising development, a Male court has convicted former President Abdulla Yameen in a money-laundering case, and sentenced him to $ 5 million in fine and five years in prison. If Yameen’s defence fails to get a clean acquittal from the high court and/or the supreme court in due course, he may not be able to contest the next presidential election in 2023.
In convicting and sentencing Yameen, the unanimous verdict of the five-judge bench of the trial court upheld the prosecution case that as President, he was guilty of laundering $1 million deposited to his bank account by a company that was used to channel resort acquisition fees due to the Government. When contested even when he was in power, Yameen had transferred the tainted money to an escrow account held together with the nation’s anti-corruption constitutional watch-dog, but the court was not impressed.
For the common man on Maldivian streets, the Yameen conviction brings back memories of courts under his administration sentencing a predecessor in Mohammed Nasheed, now Parliament Speaker, to a 13-year imprisonment, resulting in the latter fleeing the nation on ‘prison leave’ for medical reasons and obtaining political asylum from the UK.
It was the second time that Nasheed was obtaining British asylum, the earlier one coming his way when Yameen’s now-estranged elder brother, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, was President for 30 long years. Though the West brushed aside Maldivian official contention in this regard, it all led to the Maldivian people deposing the ‘autocratic’ Yameen in the presidential poll of September 2018.
In a way, the Yameen conviction was not wholly unexpected, as the case was mostly dependent on documentary evidence, of which there was possibly enough and more. Physical witnesses included Yameen’s estranged one-time Vice-President Ahmed Adeeb, whom he got impeached and his administration sent to prison for an alleged assassination attempt against the President.
Be it as it may, the Yameen conviction, like the one against Nasheed, became controversial after the chair of the original single-judge bench complained that a government personality had tried to influence him, on the morning of the verdict. The Government of President Ibrahim Mohammed Solih, Yameen’s democratic successor, moved swiftly – but not to investigate the judge’s claims and allegations.
Instead, the politically-entrenched judicial watch-dog, constituted as one more of the ‘Independent Institutions’ under the 2008 ‘democracy’ Constitution, suspended the complainant-judge and caused the creation of the new, five-judge Bench. Given the way successive democracy era governments have handled the nation’s Judiciary, it is anybody’s guess now how the superior courts will handle Yameen’s appeal, as and when moved.
It is more than a single judge and a single case, since. Especially after the MDP obtained a two-thirds majority in the 87-member Parliament, following the elections in April this year, the MDP Government has managed to get all five Supreme Court judges impeached by the Parliament, so very casually, taking the JSC/ACC route – of the Judicial Services Commission and the Anti-Corruption Commission, respectively.
In terms of processes, the current one has differed from the one that President Nasheed had followed and failed, at least up to a point. In trying to institutionalise the ‘independent Judiciary’ concept under the 2008 Constitution that he was called upon to implement, Nasheed as President negotiated the re-constitution of the Supreme Court Bench through negotiations with the Opposition-majority Parliament and failed.
This led to a constitutional logjam in which the Supreme Court was ordered to be closed for want of money-allocation from the Consolidated Funds, in mid-August 2010, and calling in the armed forces to guard the premises, as if to send out a message. A compromise was arrived at, and both the Executive and Parliament had their ways – or, could dub the ‘compromise’ as one.
In contrast, the Yameen regime increased the number of SC judges from five to seven, to purportedly place ‘pliable judges’ on the Bench. One of them was the chair of the three-judge trial court Bench that had sent Nasheed to 13 years’ in jail under a rarely used anti-terror law of 1989. This judge was also the first one to go ignominiously under the Solih regime. The last one to be impeached thus was the judge who had stalled JSC proceedings against the other.
In between, the MDP government had also got the Parliament to reduce the number of judges from seven to five, which may have been the most appropriate actions of the Solih government on the judiciary front. In short, whatever successor governments in the first 11 years of the 2008 Constitution, in the name of judicial reforms, has left much to be desired and even less to appreciate.
No one is talking about it, for the want of a political option and also to give the Solih-Nasheed’s ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) time to clean the autocracy re-introduced and institutionalised all over again by the Yameen regime. Yet, the way the Solih government handled the Yameen trial may have left a bad taste in the mouth of otherwise decisive ‘swing voters’, who identified with the MDP, first during the electoral removal of Gayoom (2008) and that of Yameen only last year.
There is a genuine concern. The nation’s first democracy Government, of President Nasheed, lost the continued support and sympathy of the ‘swing voters’ mainly on two counts. The first was the midnight arrest of Criminal Court Chief Judge, Abdulla Ahmed, after the otherwise controversial officer had granted bail for an Opposition leader, who was in the forefront of anti-Government street-protests in early 2012.
The other was the way the Nasheed presidency came to handle the street-protests otherwise, too, by withdrawing both police and army security for the protestors – and allowing a competing MDP rally, not far away from the venue of the other. The MDP’s claims to a ‘military coup’ against the Nasheed presidency had their origins in this late evening decision to withdraw security for peaceful anti-Government protestors, demanding his exit on otherwise unsustainable ‘anti-Islam’ allegations.
As if this were not enough for ‘democracy acolytes’ in the country, Home Minister Adhaalath Party alliance leader, Sheikh Imran Abdulla, has rejected demands for restoring the original non-licensed protests and rallies as mandated in the 2008 Constitution – but amended by the intervening administration of President Mohammed Waheed in 2012.
A possible long-term prison-term for Yameen, who still heads the main Opposition PPM-NPC combine with other allies, could create a political vacuum of sorts, as it after the electoral defeat of half-brother Gayoom in 2008. Though not really in larger public reckoning to be President in the near future, Yameen, like Gayoom and Nasheed before him, now requires the party more than the other way round – to fight his legal cases as political causes on Maldivian streets.
Already, his cadres have staged protests against his conviction, calling it ‘political vendetta’. The police action against the protestors was on expected lines – as has continued under successive Governments. Yameen himself has termed his trial, conviction and sentence as a way to liquidate his party and political base.
In a nation where electoral alliance (alone) have helped unseat the incumbent successively (whether under the democracy scheme or earlier), Yameen is no more seen as the ‘unifying force’, as ahead of Elections-2013, in which he got elected. There is none else in sight, who could inspire not only fellow Opposition parties and leaders, of which and whom there are many – each one with his own presidential aspiration.
In all this, Yameen’s 42 percent vote-share in last year’s presidential polls will entice every section, both in the Opposition and the Government. Victor Solih got the highest-ever 58 percent in alliance with the currently estranged few. Thanks, however, to alliance-split ahead of the April parliamentary polls this year, the MDP got only 46-perrcent vote-share even while winning two-thirds majority in Parliament (many of them by thin margins).
As if apprehensive about meeting the voter just now, Government leaders in between were talking about postponing the nation-wide island council elections from 2020, by two years – to a five-year term. Indications are that the divided Opposition would bide time until after the island council elections, if held next year as originally scheduled. They would then possibly review their current strategy of inaction, until after the MDP had won the sheen from the recent past and Yameen’s political fate is also fixed by the courts – one way or the other.
In context, the MDP’s national council meeting that re-elected Nasheed President, unopposed, for one more term, recently, recorded poor attendance. According to Maldivian media reports, only about a quarter of the party’s highest-ever 87,000 registered members (the highest also for any party in the country) turned up. Nasheed cited western democratic experience in this regard to justify the poor turn-out, but not everyone is convinced.
Critics argue that people, who had expected more than political moves of the legal and judicial kind targeting adversaries of different kind, are slowly losing interest, not only in the MDP but possibly in the democracy movement as a whole. In a nation without effective left-leaning political alternatives to challenge the status quo, the incumbent Government’s right and bold acknowledgement to the presence of Al-Qaeda and ISIS affiliate, global terror-groups, could be saying a lot.
As the world gears up for the public hearing on the mass genocide of Rohingyas to begin on 10 December, for holding Myanmar’s State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi and other actors responsible, which led to the exodus of more than 700,000 Rohingyas to neighbouring Bangladesh, one wonders how her own country is dealing with this new crisis. It is well known that Aung San Suu Kyi will head the legal team contesting the case in the International Court of Justice.
A Nobel Peace laureate held under house-arrest under the erstwhile military junta, Suu Kyi, in her acceptance speech in 2012, declared that her aim was “to create a world free from the displaced, the homeless and the hopeless, a world of which each and every corner is a true sanctuary where the inhabitants will have the freedom and the capacity to live in peace”. It has thus become ironical that the international community is charging her with violations on those very counts.
The International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, is the highest judicial body of the UN. It was established in 1945 to deal with disputes between states. It should not be confused with the treaty-based International Criminal Court, also in The Hague, which handles war crime cases against individuals. The ICJ’s 15-judge panel has historically dealt with border disputes. Increasingly, however, it also hears cases brought by states accusing others of breaking obligations under UN treaties.
Gambia, a tiny, mainly Muslim West African state backed by the 57-nation Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC), has lodged a lawsuit in the International Court of Justice in October against Myanmar for genocide, including mass murder and rape. Gambia and the OIC brought the case under the 1948 Genocide Convention. Both Gambia and Myanmar are signatories.
The convention obliges the 150 signatory countries not to commit genocide, and also to prevent and punish genocide. It defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”
There remains a discrepancy between the opinions of Myanmar and the international community over the said genocide. The international community calls the atrocities committed on the Rohingyas, the mass killings and rapes as the text book example of ethnic cleansing. The head of a U.N. fact-finding mission on Myanmar warned that there is a serious risk of genocide recurring, and the mission also stated in its final report in September that Myanmar should be held responsible in international legal forums for alleged genocide against the Rohingya.
Myanmar has strongly denied carrying out organized human rights abuses. The country maintains that the military action, which followed militant attacks on security forces in August 2017, as a legitimate counter insurgency operation. Myanmar has rejected the UN findings as "one-sided". The state counsellor has consistently in various occasions stated that her government could have handled the situation in Rakhine state better, but did not acknowledge to any major crimes.
Despite the atrocities committed people in Myanmar continue to support the NLD government. About 700 people rallied on 1 December to show support for Aung San Suu Kyi, as she prepares to defend the country against charges of genocide at the UN’s highest court.
Members of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) party swelled the ranks in front of the colonial-era City Hall in Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, as the crowd waved national flags and listened to music and poetry. “Mother Suu is the bravest human being in the world — her weapon is love.” is what the crowd chanted. Even slogans and banners “We stand with you, Mother Suu” made their appearance.
Thus, it is quite interesting to observe that the population in general also feel that no harm or atrocities have been committed over the Rohingyas. It seems that the population is convinced that the minority Rohingya muslims do not belong in their nation and thus, should be asked to leave. The country mostly engulfed under internal strife with ethnic groups has been mostly going through ups and downs but the support for the state counsellor and her government has not gone down.
When filing the case, Gambia’s justice minister and attorney general, Abubacarr Marie Tambadou, wanted to send a clear message to Myanmar and to the rest of the international community that the world must not stand by and do nothing in the face of terrible atrocities that are occurring. It is a shame for the current generation to do nothing while genocide is unfolding right in front of their eyes.
It is high time for the people in general to wake up and realise that the harsh and ruthless human conditions a particular community has to endure is in fact unjust. Though it is good that the international law is finally being enacted but whether such an action will help the community which had to undergo persecutions since 1977 remains to be seen.
A recent data made available by the World Bank precisely focuses on the importance of international aid for the country’s holistic development. There is also hope for political stability. In this circumstance, the grant from the international community is vital. Around USD 6 billion to USD 8 billion has been estimated each year between 2020 and 2014 as the required assistance. This might also help the country in reducing violence.
A recent survey is being conducted by The Asia Foundation-Afghanistan (2019), with the support of USAID, to gather Afghan opinion on the re-establishment of peace in the country. They were also in favour of holding peace talks with the Taliban. ‘This is the broadest and longest-running nation-wide survey of Afghan attitudes and opinions’. This opinion would also help the policy makers in prioritising the way ahead.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina this week urged the global community to take responsibility for climate migrants. To the Prime Minister, people will be displaced for no fault of their own, and hence international community must shoulder the responsibility of accommodating them and providing them with a livelihood. Bangladesh is one of the countries that is expected to be adversely affected by climate change. It is likely to lose a vast tract of land following rise in the sea level due to climate change, causing mass displacement. Prime Minister Hasina’s observations came while addressing a general roundtable discussion at the 25th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP25) at Feria de Madrid in Spain this week.
China offered $2.13 billion in loans for various projected key projects. In this respect, the two countries will sign agreements by June next year. The decision was arrived at the maiden meeting of a Bangladesh-China Joint Working group in Dhaka this week. The joint working group was formed to investigate the slow progress of 27 projects involving around $20 billion that China promised to provide during President Xi Jinping’s visit to Bangladesh in October 2016.
During Foreign Minister Tandi Dorji’s recent trip to India, some progress was made at the political level in finding a solution to the 2560 MW Sunkosh, a bilateral project between India and Bhutan that was currently stuck due to differences between the two countries on the implementation modality. Dorji said that both sides have agreed to take forward the discussions that have so far failed to yield results. Last round of meeting was held on 21 and 22 October, but it failed to end deadlock on the project.
An experts’ team from India will soon visit Bhutan to carry out a detailed project report on the county’s multi-disciplinary super-specialty hospital. The hospital is one of the major flagship pledges of the government. India has committed support in establishing the super-specialty hospital in the country. Construction of the 500-bed multi-disciplinary super-specialty hospital is one of the major projects in the pipeline in the 12th plan. The hospital would have facilities for kidney transplant, cardiac surgery, comprehensive cancer treatment, nuclear medicine and fertility centre, among others.
The four persons who were accused in the case of rape and brutal murder of a woman veterinarian on 27 November have been killed in an exchange of fire with the police at Chatanpally of Shadnagar, 50 km from Hyderabad on 6 December 2019. Meanwhile, the National Human Rights Commission has issued a notice to the Telangana Police on Friday’s encounter and called it a "matter of concern." The victim's family has responded to the encounter as "justice been done ". A host of political leaders and public figures have also expressed their satisfaction over the police encounter and hoped that this would send a strong message against violence against women.
The Union Cabinet approved the draft Citizenship Amendment Bill that proposes citizenship for religious minorities from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan and not for muslims. The bill was earlier passed in the Lok Sabha during the tenure of the first Modi government but it failed to get the approval of Rajya Sabha and hence it lapsed. The reintroduction of the bill is setting the stage for a parliamentary showdown with opposition parties that have called the move divisive. The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2019, gives Indian citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians if they entered India from the three nearby countries on or before 31 December 2014. It is expected to be placed before Parliament next week.
Parliament has passed a record MVR 37.8 billion ($2.4 billion) budget for 2020, and has increased expenditure by MVR 366 m. Cleared by 77 votes in an 87-member House, the budget has an additional MVR 10 b added to infrastructure projects at the committee stage. With this, the deficit has gone up from the Government-proposed MVR 7 b, or 5.8 percent of the GDP, to 6.2 pc. In addition to selling T-bills and bonds in the domestic market, the Government also plans to sell a $300 million ‘samurai bond’ in Japan. A sum of MVR 1.9 billion was earmarked for debt-repayment.
Parliament confirmed President Ibrahmin Soliih’s nominee, Muthasim Adnan, who was unceremoniously removed by the predecessor Abdulla Yameen regime in December 2014, as the nation’s new Chief Justice. The re-appointment became possible after the Government, through a series of controversial moves, got Parliament to remove all five Justices inherited from the Yameen days, impeached by Parliament, again through charges and means that are otherwise contestable. Likewise, the House also approved Hussain Shameem as the new Prosecutor-General, after predecessor Aishath Bisham, appointed again by the Yameen dispensation, quit at the last-minute, ahead of an impeachment vote. Opposition members continued to protest the new appointments and boycotted the vote.
In an interview to an Indian web-journal, Parliament Speaker and ruling MDP chief, Mohammed Nasheed, has attacked Commonwealth Secretary-General, Baronness Patricia Scotland, for delaying Maldives’ re-entry in to the global club of erstwhile British colonies. A former President, Nasheed said the Baronness was wantonly delaying Commonwealth processes for re-entry, by almost a year now, and recalled how she was an international consultant for predecessor President, Abdulla Yameen.
A Taiwan-led industrial zone half the size of the Thilawa Special Economic Zone (SEZ) is under construction in the northwest of Yangon. The 890-hectare Htantabin Technology Park aims at creating 150,000 jobs and attract over $330 million in investments over the next eight years. The backers of the project estimate that the figure will rise to US$840 million in 15 years. The project is led by Wedtex Industrial Corporation, a Taipei-based lace maker, which saw the potential of Myanmar as a manufacturing base as early as 2009, before the country opened up. Once launched though, the Taiwan-backed zone will rival its more high-profile counterparts in attracting investors to set up shop with land leases of up to 70 years, tax exemptions, as well as infrastructure such as wastewater treatment system and electricity.
Myanmar Union Minister of Investment and Foreign Economic Relations U Thaung Tun, in his capacity as the vice chair of the Development Assistance Coordination Unit (DACU) at the 2nd Development Effectiveness Roundtable which started in Nay Pyi Taw on 4 December, stressed that the mobilization and coordination of a wide variety of sources of development finance are required to achieve the vision set forth within the Myanmar Sustainable Development Plan. He said that poverty in Myanmar is on the decline, access to education and life-saving medicines is on the rise, and a second wave of social and economic reforms is underway, while economic growth remains strong by both regional and global standards.
Randall G. Schriver, US Assistant Secretary for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs, recently called upon the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence of Nepal, Ishwor Pokhrel. This meeting was primarily based on Nepal’s engagement within the Indo-Pacific, which had created an issue some time back, given the Himalayan country’s denial to be part of any power grouping as portrayed by the US. As of now, the situation seems positive.
The Supreme Court of Nepal recently called out against visual pollution from various walls, hoardings and boards, to maintain a good a congenial social environment. With regard to this, several lawmakers including the Home Minister of Nepal, Ram Babu Thapa was summoned by the Supreme Court. This step is another progress towards a federal polity in Nepal.
According to a recent press release, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved an emergency loan of $ 1 billion to Pakistan so as to provide urgent support to the country’s dwindling economy. The loan is part of a multi-donor economic reform programme that is being led by the International Monetary Fund to stabilise Pakistan’s economy which started faltering since the middle of 2008. The loan has however been provided only after the government undertook a series of reforms.
Speaking at the meeting of a panel, Pakistani Federal Minister for Planning Development and Reforms Asad Umar stated that the Pakistan government is trying to secure a 9 billion dollar loan from China for the Main Railway Line at around two per cent interest. Furthermore Umar announced that no allocations would be made in the next Public Sector Development Programme for unapproved projects until more land is purchased and directives to enforce the same have already been issued.
The Government has officially announced the ‘integration’ of China-funded Colombo Port City on reclaimed land as a part of Sri Lankan territory. Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa has also declared that the Government would accelerate work on what his previous regime as President had initiated as the nation’s ‘financial hub’. The Port City project ran into rough weather after the previous Government of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wiickremesinghe slowed down the project as a pre-poll public commitment to shut it down if elected – in a bid to address ‘international concerns’.
Fresh strains seem to be showing up in Anglo-Sri Lankan relations in these weeks after the election of ‘war-time’ Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa as the new President, a British court has convicting and sentencing Brigadier Priyanka Fernando attached to the Sri Lankan High Commission in London, for threatening Tamil protestors, by running his fingers across his neck, indicating death for them. A Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry has reiterated that the case was politically-motivated, ignore Fernando’s diplomatic immunity guaranteed under international conventions, and the judgment, timed for the British parliamentary elections, in which the Sri Lankan Tamil community has become a crucial element in recent years. The Fernando case judgment came only days after the British Conservative Party of Prime Minister Boris Johnson, proposing a ‘two-nation’ solution to Sri Lanka’s ethnic problem in its election manifesto and re-worded it after the Sri Lankan High Commission in London, among others, protested. Coming as they do in the aftermath of the September 2018 UNHRC session as the chief mover of a fresh Sri Lanka-centric resolution on war-crimes probe, replacing the US that has since quit the UN affiliate, the two events may have gone further on to strain bilateral relations, targeting the Rajapaksas’ regime, all over again.
Said Sabir Ibrahimi, “Pakistan Sees Afghanistan Through India’s Lens”, Tolo News, 6 December 2019
Alamgir Morshed, “Japan-Bangladesh ties: Riding the next wave of globalisation”, The Daily Star, 5 December 2019
John Tripura, “CHT Accord: 22 years of promises not kept”, The Daily Star, 2 December 2019
Julian Francis , “When India recognized Bangladesh”, Dhaka Tribune, 6 December 2019
Anando Mostofa, “50 years of ‘Bangladesh’”, Dhaka Tribune, 5December 2019
Editorial, “Full execution of CHT Accord can brook no delay”, The Daily Star, 6 December 2019
Editorial, “Proliferation of small arms very worrying”, The Daily Star, 6 December 2019
Kuensel, “70th Constitution Day of India and its reflection on democratic transition in Bhutan”, 30 November 2019
Anaradhta Raman, "How electoral bonds made a bad system worse", The Hindu, 6 December 2019
Mohammed Aayoob, "Lessons from Ambedkar", The Hindu, 6 December 2019
The Hindu," A strategic pause: On RBI holding interest rate" 6th December 2019
The Hindu, “National Shame: On gender sensitisation", 4th December, 2019
The Hindu, "Waiting for change: On BCCI's reworked constitution", 4th December, 2019
Kim Jolliffe, “Three areas where Myanmar can democratise security”, The Myanmar Times, 4 December 2019
Diana Del Rosario and Dr. Lee Jae Young, “Can Myanmar’s state-owned banks turn challenges into opportunities?”, The Myanmar Times, 2 December 2019
Pramod Mishra, “The athletes representing Nepal reflect the country’s identity”, The Kathmandu Post, 5 December 2019
PranabKharel and Gaurab KC, “Living in turbulent times”, Republica, 4 December 2019
Umesh K Bhattrai, “Reclaiming our land”, Republica, 3 December 2019
The Kathmandu Post, “The government owes a debt to migrant workers”, 6 December 2019
The Himalayan Times, “Vexed expats”, 6 December 2019
Sakib Sherani, “Chasing hot money”, Dawn, 6 December 2019
Asha’ar Rehman, “Change — not of faces”, Dawn, 6 December 2019
Dawn, “An odd settlement”, 6 December 2019
The Express Tribune, “Removal of encroachments”, 6 December 2019
Kusal Perera, “Geopolitics with Gotabaya minus kurukan satakaya”, Daily Mirror Online, 6 December 2019
N Sathiya Moorthy, “https://www.rediff.com/news/column/can-india-trust-gota-and-the-rajapaksas/20191205.htm”, Rediff.com, 5 December 2019
Ravi Nagahawatte, “Why Modi loves Gota”, Daily Mirror Online, 5 December 2019
Kelum Bandara, “Indo-Lanka ties: Defence cooperation takes the centre-stage, 13th Amendment takes a back-seat”, Daily Mirror Online, 5 December 2019
N Sathiya Moorthy, ”https://ceylontoday.lk/print-more/46362” , Ceylon Today, 3 December 2019
N Sathiya Moorthy, “Who should blink first – and why?”, Colombo Gazette, 2 December 2019
N Sathiya Moorthy, “https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/sri-lanka-president-rajapaksas-visit-to-india-lay-premise-for-resetting-bilateral-ties-58282/”, www.orfonline.org, 2 December 2019
Afghanistan: Shubhangi Pandey
Bangladesh: Joyeeta Bhattacharjee
Bhutan: Mihir Bhonsale
India: Ambar Kumar Ghosh
Maldives & Sri Lanka: N Sathiya Moorthy
Myanmar: Sreeparna Banerjee
Nepal: Sohini Nayak
Pakistan: Sohini Bose
The views expressed above belong to the author(s). ORF research and analyses now available on Telegram! Click here to access our curated content — blogs, longforms and interviews.
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