No Free Lunch for Waheed

2012-05-24T18:46:00.001+05:00

Dr Baaghee Waheed Maniku has accepted an invitation to eat at Marlborough House. The truth is that he has been made to pay heavily for this lunch, which is why he is lying about it.

His office is claiming that the lunch is part of the Official Jubilee Celebrations of Her Majesty the Queen. This is not the case.

The truth is that the Official Lunch is on Tuesday 5th June, the final day of the main celebrations called the Central Weekend. The central weekend is an extended festival of celebrations from Saturday 2nd June (the date of the anniversary of her coronation 60 years ago) to 5th June, where schools also remain closed. The culmination of the festival is on 5th June, with a prayer service in the morning at St Paul's Cathedral, followed by Jubilee Lunch at Westminster Hall, which will be followed by a Royal Procession. The official festivities end that evening as Her Majesty takes salute from the Balcony. That is the end of the official commemoration.

Waheed Manik has not been invited to this Jubilee Lunch. If he even attempts to set foot inside the Westminster Hall for the Jubilee Lunch, he will be arrested and deported.

What he has been invited for is an event AFTER the official celebrations. It is a lunch hosted on 6th June by the Commonwealth Secretary General Mr Kamlesh Sharma of India. It will be held at the Commonwealth Offices at Marlborough House where Azima, Hassan Saeed and Farah had been meeting with CMAG. The Queen and the Duke will of course attend this, as she is the Head of the Commonwealth.

Therefore, Waheed is coming to eat Dhigu Riha on Walhu Eid. He has NOT been invited to the official celebrations of Her Majesty.

Even so, he has had to pay a steep price to be there. He is there only because he avoided being suspended from the Commonwealth at the last minute by agreeing to three conditions set by CMAG. These conditions were that a) CNI must be made independent, impartial, credible and generally acceptable, and complete its work by 31 July 2012; b) that there should be elections held in 2012; c) that President Nasheed must not be arrested.

Lie No:2 . Waheed Maniku is claiming that he has been invited to a "meeting of Heads of State of Commonwealth". This is also not true. While Dr Maniku will be able to attend meetings of Commonwealth Heads because he has avoided suspension, the event in London is a lunch and not a meeting. Eating Dhigu Riha on Walu Eid is not a meeting of the Commonwealth.

Waheed's lunch on 6th June is comparable to Gayoom's reception a the House of Lords on 16 July 2007, where the price of admission was to make an open promise to the Lords that he will hold free and fair elections in 2008, that he will allow parties to contest, that he will establish an independent judiciary and an independent elections commission before the elections. Following this pledge, Lord Robert Evans came to Maldives on 18 December 2007 and declared that Gayoom will be held to his pledge, and Lord Mark Malloch-Brown, the UK Foreign Minister, visited Maldives on 22 July and reminded Gayoom to not drag his feet over the ratification of the new Constitution.

So, after Waheed eats his lunch, he will be forced to call early elections and forced to not harass President Nasheed, and forced to complete an independent and speedy investigation!

Waheed gets lunch; we get the dessert!

As economists will tell you, there is no such thing as a free lunch! Even for Ilham!

Is it time for a new narrative?

2012-05-06T23:00:00.002+05:00

It is going to be nearly 100 days since the coup. Or should we say that it will be 100 days since life returned to normality and back to tradition; and that the three year old “experiment” with democracy had failed.

Undoubtedly there will be several who would subscribe to that view, some in degree while others in kind. With our history steeped in autocratic rulers, one after the other, the three years and a bit under President Mohamed Nasheed and his attempt to introduce what for many is an alien ideology to the Maldives, it is of little surprise that many would consider this change of government by force the norm rather than the exception. For some it is even more than just a historical re-run of what has been happening in the Maldives. It is part and parcel of our culture too that we have acquired from our ancestors.

For an example, let us take a brief look at our folklore and the stories that have been handed down from generations to generations in our country. Let’s have a quick analysis of one of the most famous of them all: - The story of Fidhana and Bodana.

Here is Fidhana who had lost his house in a storm because he was stupid and silly to built it with “fee iloshi”. And here is Bodana who was sensible enough to built his house with teak. Bodana in his kindness invite the hapless Fidhana into his house and offers him sanctuary. While Fidhana makes an enormous fuss about not being able to sleep in what was patiently offered by his host, he also turns out to be a conniving guest and goes on to steal from his host.

When Bodana discovers his guest had violated the sanctity of his hospitality by stealing from him, one cannot help but secretly empathise with the kindly Bodana irrespective of him beating up Fidhana. But then herein lies the twist. Not only is Fidhana not made to apologize and mend his ungodly ways; Fidhana also receives the gold trunk and comes out as the hero of the story while Bodana, who was the gracious host in the first place, ended up in the hellhole.

Moral of the story: Do stupid things, be ungrateful and stab the back of those who are kind to you; and you will end up with the pot of gold!

No wonder our politicians have turned out the way they have. I am not suggesting that we have our folk stories to blame for all the ills of our country but one cannot help but wonder. In a culture such as this, can one try to introduce a narrative where each individual not only have rights but also responsibilities, and the collective will of the mass will carry the day?

In this situation what is the way forward? Mohamed Nasheed appeared to have sown the seeds of this ideology, whether some of us like it or not. And whether one accepts his ways and means of doing so, it is already done. That is a verified truism that we cannot regress from. But the beauty of this is that it is not just sowing the seeds of democracy. It is the scramble to claim it as their own even by those who would rather rule by the bullet than the ballot.

The answer to the future seems to be with those who are of the internet generation. The revolution that technology brought to the Maldvies was what got rid of the 30 year old dictatorship. The answer lies with those of us whose lives are no longer lived on an island but are inter-connected with all those fellow Maldivians right across this archipelago and around the world via the highway of computers and mobile phones. Those of us who are sipping coffee in the coffee shops while facebooking or tweeting out our thoughts and beliefs; those who are discussing the future of our country with fellow Maldivians who we have never met in real life; those who staunchly support that it is time we moved from the traditional narrative to a modern 21^st century one; those of us who believe that no matter which political colour we may wear, our first and foremost allegiance is to the people of our country; That the will of the people must take precedence first and foremost.

It is time to shelve the story of Fidhana and Bodana to the annals of our history and move on to a new one. That one day in the not so distant future the old folks will be telling the story of “The Iruvaa hudhu and the Dhondheeni” – where the rights of both are respected and there is accountability with responsibility. It is up to our generation to make that story happen.

New Dhivehi Observer

No Free Lunch for Waheed

Is it time for a new narrative?