Three MPL Employees dismissed for dishonesty in cargo clearance

Three employees of MPL have been dismissed from work for dishonest conduct in clearing cargo at the Male’ Commercial Harbor.

The CEO of MPL Hussein Hilmy said today that three employees in their Operations Department were dismissed last Thursday for collaborating with the export company in making changes to the necessary documents for the clearance of the goods.

Hilmy said that other departments of the company also cooperated in this fraud, and that the matter will be looked into very seriously.

“From the investigations so far, we believe that the documents for one out of two containers which were sent by the same company, were altered by our employees in collaboration with the owners, before the goods were cleared from the harbor. The employees were dismissed for their involvement in this dealing,” Hilmy said.

“Changed were made even to our system. This was done with the support of other departments as well, not just by those dismissed,” Hilmy said.

Hilmy said that the Police and Customs are working together in investigating this matter, however, did not specify how much cargo was cleared under this dealing.

MPL said that following this matter, security of the harbor has been strengthened and the quality in the preparation of documents has also been improved.

“More screening will be done now, and the security at the gates has been increased. Also, as the documents were changed manually, we have now ensured that manual changes cannot be made to documents in the future,” Hilmy said.