President Mohamed Nasheed

Fiona Bruce Excerpts

Wednesday 7th November 2012 Westminster Hall

[John Glen (Salisbury) (Con)]

Thank you, Mrs Brooke, for calling me to speak and it is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

First, I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Karen Lumley) for her tireless work over the last five years in the Maldives. I share her passion for the Maldives, as the former President Nasheed went to school just outside my constituency. A considerable number of my constituents knew him during the many years he spent as a freedom fighter seeking democracy in his country.

I want today to reflect on my great sadness when this coup—it was indeed a coup—happened in February. Eighteen months ago, the former President was described by our Prime Minister as his “new best friend”, and yet, frustratingly, we cannot seem to do anything now to reflect the reality of what is happening on the ground in the Maldives.

Let us be clear that this issue is not just about one round of elections, but securing democracy for the long term and establishing the rule of law. Public bodies need to act in accordance with constitutional rights. In the Maldives, the rule of law was badly compromised before 2008 under the Gayoom regime. The judicial services commission published very weak evaluation criteria for the judges, and swore in the former President Gayoom’s appointed judges to permanent positions as supreme court members before the legislature could set down its criteria.

Let us be clear and get this on the record unambiguously: those judges included judges who had been found guilty of misconduct, judges with cases pending against them and judges who were under criminal investigation. Cases that were never brought to completion or sentencing include: Abdulla Hameed, brother of the deposed President Gayoom, for fraud; Algeen Abdul Gayoom, half-brother of President Gayoom, for corruption; and Isthafa Ibrahim Maniku, head of the prisons division under President Gayoom, for torture and cruelty. Those are serious allegations, and these individuals are now in the judiciary, judging and professing that there will be a fair trial for the deposed President Nasheed.

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Karen Lumley) for securing this debate, the importance of which was brought home to me in October when I met two members of the Maldives Parliament and the former high commissioner of the Maldives, very shortly after Anni’s arrest. Not only had he been arrested, but they informed me that several members of the Maldives Parliament—I believe as many as 13—had been arrested and charged with criminal offences, coincidentally all at much the same time. Does my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) agree that democracy is a fragile flower that we cannot take for granted, but must work at and protect; that when the going gets rough we have to stand with our friends in other countries and be counted; and that we should do so now for the Maldives?

[John Glen]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, which expresses extremely well the guts of the case that we are all bringing today to Westminster Hall.

As I was saying, the allegations against the “judges”—if one can call them that—are very serious. For example, the allegation made against Abdulla Mohamed, the chief judge of the criminal court, by the attorney-general in 2005 was that he had asked children to act out an indecent act in court during a sexual abuse case. Such a case totally explains why the Maldives is in such a mess. The former President Nasheed, having secured a democratic mandate, simply sought to deal with a corrupt judiciary. He did so in good faith and with the support of the country. As a Government, we now need to stand up for him and fight for him, so that he has a fair trial and so that we can restore democracy, which was at such an early stage in the Maldives. It is so disappointing to see the Maldives in this state and to see its democracy so endangered, after such a promising start four years ago.