Raajje News Blog

Male', Maldives. Maldivians watch stunned as new President Mohamed Waheed calmly invites foreign interference in their domestic affairs, just two weeks after he ascended to power following the resignation on strongman Mohamed Nasheed. Claiming to be a national unity government, the inexperienced Waheed administration is falling over its two left feet dancing to Bollywood music mixed with European colonial lyrics. The Waheed government's capitulation of Maldivian national interests and national sovereignty is unprecedented by any Maldivian government at anytime throughout the country's long history. Throughout the annals of our history Maldives maintained her sovereignty and defended uncorrupted Islam as her religion by maintaining policies of non-interference in our domestic affairs by foreign powers. A small island state in the vast Indian Ocean, overshadowed by the looming mass of India in the North, Maldives has weathered many turbulent political storms, emerging some...

Male', Maldives. Even as Nasheed's Maldives Democratic Party (MDP) capitulated and came to the negotiating table, Maldivian hopes for true democratic reform waned today as political parties undermined President Waheed's proposed Reform Roadmap. Key political leaders stayed away from the much anticipated All-Party talks today, instead sending representatives of little or no political weight. Citizen confidence in the Talks died as the whole exercise was exposed as just another drama of going though the motions of following due democratic process. President Waheed's appointment of Ahamed Mujuthaba, the first Human Rights Commissioner of Maldives, was widely appreciated by the general public as Mujuthaba was seen as a person who would be acceptable to the aggrieved Nasheed and MDP. Although Mujuthaba filled cabinet posts in the Gayoom government, he gained credence amongst opposition for his later vocal and financial support to the MDP movement. Of the political parti...