Jailed ex-VP Adeeb cannot be made party leader, says Elections Commission

Former vice president Ahmed Adeeb, who is serving a decades-long jail sentence, cannot be made leader of a political party, the Elections Commission has said.

The commission directed as such after the Maldives Third Way Democrats (MTD) elected the former vice president to the position after registration on Thursday.

RaajjeMV questioned Elections Commissioner Ahmed Shareef about the matter, who said that the commission has not yet been informed of Adeeb’s appointment.

Shareef further said that Adeeb cannot be appointed as a party leader under the Prisons and Parole Act, as per a contentious amendment in 2015, which was said to have been passed and ratified to disqualify former president Mohamed Nasheed from his party.

The law was amendment so as to bar convicts from participating in political parties or civil society organizations as anything more than a general member, therefore Adeeb cannot legally be appointed party leader or even participate in any party activity.

Prior to Adeeb’s appointment on Thursday night, his wife, Mariyam Nashwa addressed criticism over Adeeb being made the central figure of a local political party saying that such ‘naysaying’ is discriminatory as others have been freely allowed to do so in the past.

Nashwa’s tweet on the matter translates to, ‘It is OK to frame Adeeb, it is OK for Adeeb to not receive justice, it is OK for him to be sentenced on political charges, it is OK for his political sentence to not be reviewed, it is OK for someone else to falsely act out the ‘Finifenmaa’ drama and keep 100 million of the MMPRC funds in their account, a bit much!”.

Nashwa is referring to former president Abdulla Yameen’s claim that the blast aboard the presidential speedboat ‘Fininfemaa’ was an attempt on his life, and the police investigation into large sums of money in his bank account.

Among several sentences for which Adeeb was found guilty, include orchestrating the reported assassination attempt, embezzlement through the state-run Maldives Marketing and Public Relations Corporation (MMPRC), as well as weapons possession’.

Adeeb’s lawyers and family have noted gross violation of his right to a fair trial and access to legal representation, with Nashwa having said earlier this month that some of the hearings in Adeeb’s trial were held inside a make-shift courtroom set up at a detention facility.