Police Search for Evidence in Nazim’s Office

The police raided opposition MP Ahmed Nazim's office Sunday, apparently in search of incriminating evidence in relation to allegations levied in the Auditor General's report on the former Atolls Ministry. Released on 8th May, the report suspects three companies (in which Nazim holds shares, though he is not mentioned by name) of using corrupt practices to win a contract worth about 2 million rufiyaa for supplying harbor lights.

The three companies under suspicion are Namira, Standard and Neyza, which the report believes belong to the same owners who used them as fronts to bypass regulations that require a minimum of three quotations for a bid to be valid. The report does not specifically say whether the three are legal companies duly registered with the Trade Ministry, though this appears to be the case when one considers indirect references to their shareholders.

Police raided Nazim's office at 1.20 am on the night of 24th May and seized a number of documents, a laptop computer and two hard drives. This was done under a search warrant issued by the Criminal Court.

The raid comes two weeks after the Audit Report and one week after President Mohamed Nasheed created a presidential commission to investigate misappropriation of state funds by members of the former government.

Nazim who was recently re-elected to the parliament from Dhiggaru constituency has been the subject of many unsavory rumors, perhaps partly because of his meteoric rise to fame and fortune. Notable among the rumors are alleged misuse of his position in STELCO to promote his personal trade in electrical goods and alleged corrupt practices relating to rural electrification projects. However, none of these allegations have ever been proved against him.

Recovering even a single copper coin may be difficult

“This is your ransom. Two million dollars in unmarked bills, just like you wanted...,” Tom Mullen (Mel Gibson) in the 1996 movie ‘Ransom.’

Why, do you think, former President Gayoom (allegedly) used to pay in cash in his many trips abroad, in this day and age when all self-respecting presidents make their payments in credit cards or bank transfers? We may never know why he did it, but from watching thriller movies we have a fairly good idea why some others do it. (See quote above). It leaves no paper or electronic trail – and makes it that much more difficult to trace. Recovering even a single copper coin of embezzled money –if any –would be near impossible.

Dead ends and cold trails
Some years back I asked the Philippines Ambassador about the progress of recovering the over 1 billion dollars allegedly embezzled by former dictator Marcos. It appears that less than 1% of the sum was recovered, while the expenditure on the international investigations was higher. Marcos had transferred the money to dummy companies he had created. Investigators hunted the money from company to company across the globe. But in each case the trail ultimately disappeared in a non-existent company. Marcos had developed a smart way to cover his trail. But perhaps smarter would be to leave no trail at all.

Wealth beyond known sources of income
When Gayoom came to power in 1978, members of his family and in-laws were middle class people, some struggling with debts. When he left power in 2008, many of them were unimaginably rich, owning resorts and vast land holdings in Male. Many people believe such richness is well beyond their known sources of income. There are rumors of commissions, kickbacks and gifts for favors to international parties. It is unlikely that any records of such transactions would be uncovered in an investigation.

Siphoning?
For most of Gayoom’s regime government offices were required to import their needs of machinery and heavy equipment through STO and MGTC. Often the quotations from these companies were 2 to 3 times higher than direct quotes from suppliers. What happens to the difference between the two? Again, no evidence is likely to be uncovered.

Thus, it is quite likely that not a single copper coin is recovered in the investigation of the alleged corruption of the former government. So is it worthwhile to investigate? I’ll repeat here the answer that the Philippines Ambassador gave to this question: “Yes, it’s important to investigate. Even if no money is recovered, it will send a strong message to leaders who might think of becoming corrupt in the future.”

Corrupting the Citizen

By Ahmed Afaal

On October 8, 2008 and on October 28, 2008 the Maldives underwent arguably the most democratic, the freest and the fairest elections in her entire history. This paves the new direction for future elections in the country.

Among the elections held in the country, the upcoming parliamentary election would be one that needs to be watched very carefully. In the past parliamentary elections have been influenced by money, and people with high governmental influence. Maldives went through a stage where the people were, in my words "made corrupt" by persuading them to accept money, goods and many other favours. This lead to a mass corruption where votes were given in return for something, i.e. votes were bought and many people still think that this perhaps is the norm.

Given this, during the last two parliamentary elections a large number of new faces came into both the Special Majlis and the Majlis. Their intentions were clear from what they have done so far. They have fought definitely on behalf of the people in a way that no previous parliament has ever done. They have passed the new constitution that is modern and people friendly. Many laws, most of them good and some with flaws while other laws contradicting each other were also passed.

No one in the country can deny that the current parliament's achievement in facilitating the democratic process, making the government more accountable, and the contributions to the special Majlis in the separation of powers is historic. The achievement of the outgoing Special Majlis in getting a new constitution needs mentioning.

Ironically, the sad truth though is, in order to bring this to the people, powerful business people and other influential people had to, in my words "further corrupt the citizens" by pumping more money and doing more favours to get votes. Votes were sold to the highest bidder last time around. Perhaps this was the only way that these members could have penetrated into the parliament.

Question now is that are the same parliamentarians going to come out this election and advocate that what they did was wrong? Would they come out clean?

Maldivians will definitely watch the actions of these people carefully. Especially these were the very people during the last presidential election, were most vocal and critical about this issue targeting it to the then ruling party's actions. Also, though we have a presidential system, parties will be fighting to get as many members in. Are there going to be totally new politicians who will defy the odds? Will there be those who have the courage to stand up to make the election clean? Would there be those who would and could educate and persuade the public to go on the right path? Only time will tell. We will have to hope that this endemic does not blow into an epidemic but rather get eradicated.

[*This analysis was presented by Ahmed Afaal, for the readers of this blog. He has his own blog (No politics) at http://afaal.blogspot.com/. As always I welcome contributions from the readers of this blog, which I will publish for the benefit of other readers and to keep this blog rich in content.]