Committee finalizes composition of standing committees

Compositions of the 13 standing committees in parliament have been decided by the five-member select committee today, with 11 members in each committee and the ruling coalition holding majority of seven major committee.

With the new compositions, ruling coalition parties Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) and Maldives Development Alliance (MDA) will hold majority of; the Committee on Independent Institutions, the Committee on Oversight of the Government, the National Security Committee, the Economic Affairs Committee, Public Accounts Committee, the Privileges Committee and the General Purpose Committee.

The five-member select committee decided the compositions by vote, following disagreement between government coalition MPs and opposition parties throughout meetings held in the past two days.

The main opposition party Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) MP Ibrahim Shareef decided to boycott today’s vote of the five-member select committee, in a show frustration over MDA’s proposed compositions.

The 241 Committee - a constitutional parliamentary committee with oversight of operations of the security services - was exempted from the 11-member rule and will have 12 members in total. The 241 Committee comprises of 4 MPs from PPM, 3 MPs from MDP, 3 MPs from Jumhoory Party, 1 MP from Adhaalath Party and 1 independent MP.

At the conclusion of today’s meeting, Chair of the the five-member select committee Vilufushi MP Riyaz Rasheed announced that the finalized report on the compositions of the standing committees will be forwarded to Speaker of the Parliament today.