Former President Mohamed Nasheed has denounced the Maldivian government’s decision on Thursday after to lift Maldives’ contentious state of emergency, as political scheming.
The opposition Maldivian Democratic Party leader said, through a post on his Twitter account, that the state of emergency was lifted because President Abdulla Yameen no longer has any need for it.
President Yameen lifts the SoE because he now has no need for it. He has overrun the judiciary and legislature, arrested hundreds unlawfully and introduced a “new normal” in the #Maldives - full dictatorship. We will not give up, we will fight and we will overcome.
— Mohamed Nasheed (@MohamedNasheed) March 22, 2018
Azima Shakoor, legal affairs minister at the President’s Office, and Attorney General Mohamed Anil announced that the state of emergency has been lifted, effective from 12:00 PM on Thursday.
They revealed that the decision to lift the long-standing state of emergency comes after security forces assured the president that they could maintain ‘stability’ in the nation without its authority.
While the state of emergency’s initial declaration and extension have both been challenged over its legal validity, President Abdulla Yameen has used it to arrest and detain his political rivals as well as activists calling for his resignation.
