Why there is trouble in paradise for Maldives
There is a sense of surrealism in Maldives. Vice president Ahmed Adeeb came back from China only to find himself arrested for "high treason". Recall, much the same happened to the then prime minister of Pakistan Nawaz Sharif in 1999, when the army decided to put him behind bars. The reason given for Adeeb’s arrest was that he was involved allegedly, in the assassination attempt on president Abdulla Yameen on September 28, 2015.
On that day, a speedboat carrying Yameen, his wife and other officials were just returning to the capital city of Male when a blast occurred. First Lady Fathimath Ibrahim, ruling coalition MPs and cabinet ministers were on board. Yameen escaped unhurt, but the president’s wife, a presidential aide and a bodyguard were injured. Fathimath sustained minor fractures to her spine. The presidential party had just returned from a visit to Saudi Arabia for the Hajj and was making its way from the airport to Male when the blast occurred.
So what does one make of this conspiracy theory that got vice president Adeeb behind bars? The blast on the speedboat itself was a minor one and was meant more for scaring the party on board, than to do damage. Initially, a minister in the president’s office Mohamed Hussein Shareef said that a mechanical issue was the probable cause and discounted any connection between the explosion and political unrest over former president Mohamed Nasheed’s imprisonment. Subsequently, after international investigators looked at the boat, he announced that it was a explosion targeted at the president. Shareef has since been removed from his post.
One gets the feeling that Yameen has become a bit dictatorial, and is unwilling to listen to any suggestion on his governance of Maldives. Yameen even had the gall to tell Indian foreign minister Sushma Swaraj that his government would not tolerate foreign interference in domestic issues, referring to the efforts by the international community to free former president Nasheed.
One opposition-aligned television channel claimed that the explosion had been caused by pressure accumulating in the boat’s air-conditioning pipes. Then on October 6, 2015, Shareef claimed that the blast had been an attempt to assassinate president Yameen. Earlier in the day, Sri Lanka’s Daily Mirror said quoting an unnamed source that an explosive device had been planted under the helmsman’s seat to warn the president and not to actually kill him.
The other point of note is that Adeeb was, in fact, till his arrest, one of president Yameen’s closest confidants and earlier, the president had wanted to change the age qualifications for the office of presidency constitutionally to have Adeeb become president after Yameen’s present tenure in office got over. Clearly, this was not to be as Yameen seems to have had second thoughts.
The official charge against Adeeb is that he was not on board "Finifenmaa" when the blast occurred, increasing suspicions about his role. Further, the homes of two of his close associates were raided and his bodyguards were the first to be suspended following the inquiry. Several officials who were seen as being loyal to the former vice president have since been dismissed from office.
The "assassination" attempt, if indeed it was one, appears to have been effected more with a view to have Yameen consolidate his position. This has already been given effect to with the sacking of the police and intelligence chiefs and other officials looking after the president’s security. Yameen had appointed Adeeb as his deputy three months ago after impeaching his original running mate, Mohamed Jameel, on charges of treason.
Hours before Adeeb was arrested, the president sacked the police chief, Hussain Waheed, the latest in a series of firings seen by some as a purge of individuals whose loyalties may be in doubt. Earlier, defence minister Moosa Ali Jaleel was sacked.
Maldives faces considerable international criticism for its continued detention of Nasheed. Notably, the Nasheed episode saw the UN Agency on Arbitrary Detention recently pass strictures on the Maldivian government, but Yameen remains unfazed. Therefore, the other thing that has happened with the speedboat blast is that domestic attention has shifted away from Nasheed to the president Yameen.
The island paradise of Maldives today is in the midst of a political storm. It also faces other threats in the form of Islamic militancy and reports have surfaced of many citizens joining the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist group and making ntheir way to Syria to fight. Nasheed had warned in September 2014 that up to 200 Maldivians were fighting for the ISIS in Iraq and Syria. The US state department’s "Annual Report on Terrorism for 2014" states that “radical Maldivians have made connections with violent extremist affiliates throughout the world and a small but steady stream of Maldivians leave the country to train and fight with these groups”.
In this context, one needs to ask what India should be doing. Prime Minister Narendra Modi called off the Maldives leg of his Indian Ocean trip six months ago. India must revisit its ties with Maldives in the light of the recent events. There is no knee-jerk reaction expected from the Indian foreign office, but a more long-term and well-thought out plan of engagement needs to be worked out. Such a plan will have to take into account India’s interests and how it can assist in improving the domestic situation in Maldives.