President Waheed leaves for Malaysia on a private tour

President Dr. Mohammed Waheed Hassan Manik has left the country for Malaysia on a private tour, said the President’s Office last night.

The President departed for Malaysia last night, and he was accompanied, according to an official at the President’s Office, by his wife, First Lady Ilham Hussain.

No other details about the tour have been disclosed. Only an SMS from the President’s Office to media agencies said that the President’s tour was “private”.

The President is touring to Malaysia at a time when a Malaysian investment in the Maldives has been thrown into a legal battle.

The government has decided to terminate a contract it has entered and being performing with Malaysian company Nexbis Sdn Bhd to install and run a border control system in the Maldives. The government made the decision last week after the People’s Majlis asked the contract and enterprise under it to be terminated.

The contract between Nexbis and the government was criticized from the very beginning, even before it was signed, by the Anti-Corruption Commission of the Maldives (ACC), which vehemently said that the whole arrangement was being made on the basis of corrupt deals, and issued orders not to go ahead with it. Previous government of Mahomet Nasheed went ahead with the project ignoring the statements of ACC.

After current President Dr. Waheed took over in February this year, the new government also did pay heed to ACC’s repeated attempts to discontinue the project. The government finally gave in when the People’s Majlis made a decision on the matter.