Gayyoom will never be able to win a national election in Maldives now :: Maldives News :: Dhivehi Observer

Editorial

Gayyoom will never be able to win a national election in Maldives ever again

By A. S. I. Moosa (Sappe'), 27 December 2005

MP for Male'

MP for Addu Atoll

MP for Shaviyani

The official votes for the by-election has been announced. Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) candidates won 2 out of three with convincing majorities in both Male' the (capital of Maldives) and Addu Atoll. These two constituencies are the most heavily populated and represent 25% of the total electoral roll of the country. Mohamed Nasheed (Kaanal) and Husnu Al-Suood won Male' and Addu respectively.

DRP candidate Moosa Rameez is declared the winner in Shaviyani Atoll despite complaints about irregularities and vote rigging.

Adhaalath Party (AP) also did well by coming 3rd in all three constituencies and deserves respect for participating in the election despite lack of resources.

There were several incidents of irregularities and illegal activities including bribing voters with cash money as well as tempering with ballot boxes as was the case in Shaviyani Atoll. These activities were carried out by Gayyoom's regime to win all three seats in the by-election.

According to election laws, it is illegal to lobby for support on polling day. However, Gayyoom himself, his wife, family members as well other senior cabinet ministers were out and about Maldives along with other officials of his regime trying win votes for their candidate. This was most notable in Male'. These people went around giving people cash on condition they vote for Gayyoom's DRP backed candidates.

Another very interesting observation is that in these elections political parties, that were only allowed to register and function in June this year, were not allowed to take part and each candidate was supposed to be independent. However, the election was anything but a multi-party election as they announced officially that they backed a specific candidate. Gayyoom himself told his own party that they specifically backed 3 candidates for the 3 seats and asked his party members to do everything to elect them.

As usual turn out in Male' was low with only 44%. Experts say it could have been more than 50% had it been held another time because this is the school holiday period and many adults travel abroad and to other islands within Maldives where there are no facilities to cast their votes. For example, if there were 100 Male' residents in say Baa Atoll on holiday, there are no arrangements made for them to be able to cast their votes. It is estimated that more than 5000 Male' resident who are on the electoral roll would travel to either local islands in Maldives or abroad, most commonly to India and Sri Lanka. Also, there are no way for those abroad to cast their votes such those went on Hajj pilgrimage and those living and temporary residing abroad. Turn out in Shaviyani and Addu is high as expected, 76% and 64% respectively. These issues must be addressed in order to ensure that the democratic rights of all people are taken into consideration in elections. However, Gayyoom takes advantage of these shortfalls and people until recently had no way to express their concerns and the old guard are still in power so change can only come with the fall of Dictator Gayyoom.

Other election statistics are shown below. The winners share of the total votes was around 52-53% in all cases but MDP candidates had a considerable majority lead compared to the best looser in both Male' and Addu. It is also interesting to note that official result sheet showed that Mr. Nasheed won all but 2 ballot box counts as well. Details of Addu and Shaviyani have not yet been made official but it is unlikely that any candidate could have got more votes than Suood in any box counts in Addu as his overall lead is over 3600 votes.

There were no official arrangements for international observers to be present in this by-election but officials and supporters of all the parties kept a close eye on things that were taking place throughout the three locations. Reports of irregularities and vote rigging as well as harassment of anti-government candidates and their supporters were reported based on strong evidence. For example, Gayyoom's candidates and their supporters had no problem in lobbying for their candidates and even enter polling stations as they were issued official badges or simply they were too well known locally that they did whatever they wanted in some polling stations.

Many reformists believe that had the election been free and fair, MDP would have won the third seat as well and would have obtained even larger majorities in the other constituencies. An important point to note also is that Gayyoom is no long able to use all his dirty tricks in elections anymore because people are watching his back all the time. Attempts to rig the votes and temper with ballot boxes were hampered by popular disquiet and the strength of the voice of dissent. For example, the Election Commissioner announced unexpectedly that he was going to stop counting the vote and continue the next day. This despite the fact that he had earlier announced that provisional results for Male' would be announce the same night. When this happened, people started gathering near Dharubaaruge where the counting was taking place. Gayyoom's militia group 'Star Force' was on high alert as well but Commissioner had to retract his announcement fearing an uprising. Residents of Male' have no faith in Dictator Gayyoom so they were not willing to let him meddle with their votes this time.

Important points to learn from this election in brief are:

Gayyoom has virtually no support in Male' and Addu Atoll
Gayyoom is no longer able to arrest and detain people who are against him
Gayyoom was defeated by MDP members with overwhelming majorities despite lack of financial and human resources
All four member of the parliament for Male' are senior members of MDP
3 out of 4 Addu MPs are MDP members
Gayyoom's vote rigging attempts failed because people power is emerging
Gayyoom will never be able to win a national election now and will do his best to resist the call for earlier elections so that he can remain in power and continue running Maldives as a police state until 2008
MDP is the future of Maldives now

Special Majlis By-election Official Results Analyses


Addu Atoll
1	Husnu Al-Suood	5491	MDP
2	Dr. Abdulla Naseer	1878	DRP
3	Hussain Rasheed	1687	AP
4	Ahmed Rasheed	1110
5	Abdulla Bagir	76
	Annulled Votes	163
	Total Votes	10405
	Electoral Roll	16275
	Turn Out (%)	64%
	Winner's share of votes	53%
	Majority by votes	3613


Male'
1	Mohamed Nasheed	7120	MDP
2	Yusuf Rafeeu (Usay)	4742	DRP
3	Dr. A Majeed	1345	AP
4	Waheed A. Saeed	69
5	Mohamed Shareef	63
	Annulled Votes	202
	Total Votes	13541
	Electoral Roll	30993
	Total Votes	13541
	Turn Out (%)	44%
	Winner's share of votes	53%
	Majority by votes	2378

Shaviyani Atoll
1	Moosa Rameez	2917	DRP
2	Ahmed Anwar	1771	MDP
3	Ilyas Hussain	653	AP
4	Hassan Zahir	117
	Annulled Votes	145
	Total Votes	5603
	Electoral Roll	7396
	Turn Out (%)	76%
	Winner's share of votes	52%
	Majority by votes	1146