Report: Jaxly
Office of the Commissioner of Elections has issued a news release disclosing the reasons why the Commissioner rejected the application of Ibrahim Ismail (Ibra) of H. Bougainvilla to register Social Liberal Party. The Commissioner’s news release noted that the hot topic of the daily news papers these days is the commissioner’s refusal to register the Social Liberal Party (SLP).According to the news release Ibra on the 5 of September 2007 sent a letter to the Attorney General’s Office stating the dispute between him and the Commissioner. The news release noted that the letter was copied to Commissioner as well.
The news release further noted that instead of replying directly to Ibra, Attorney General’s response was sent to the Commissioner on the 9 of September. It stated that the response of the Attorney General was in the form of an opinion and was not in conformity with norms and procedures used by the Commissioner’s Office since the commencement of its work on registration of political parties.
Consequently the Commissioner on the 22 of October sent a letter stating that the reasons why such a legal opinion could not be accepted. At the request of the Commissioner a meeting was held at the Information Ministry to discuss the issue. The meeting was attended by the then Acting Attorney General Mohamed Nasheed and Mohamed Anil and Shiekh Shuaib Yousuf and Commissioner of Elections KD Ahmed Manik. Following the discussions it was agreed that Acting Attorney General should sent another letter to Commissioner amending his legal opinion and advising the Commissioner on how to proceed with the matter. Further the news release notes that the then Acting Attorney General Nasheed had said that procedures adopted by the Commissioner was good enough.
The Commissioner’s release reports that Ibra on four different occasions had submitted 3989 membership forms. The release also detailed how the Commissioner disqualified 2372 names. The Commissioner’s release points out that, out of the 2372 names, 1371 are names already registered as members of other parties, 12 names that has been previously been submitted to the Commissioner’s Office to be registered as members of parties that are under registration process and 989 members were disqualified for failure to provide complete information.
The Commissioner’s new release informs that Ibra was notified of the shortcomings and was asked to provide 1383 names for the successful registration of his party on the 15 of November 2007.
National Identity Cards is an important document in the registration process of political parties informed the news release. It stated that ID cards are an important means of verification in the registration process.
The Commissioner’s news release concludes by saying that Ibrahim Ismail’s application to register SLP was denied due to his failure to furnish 3000 names required for the registration within the 9 month period allocated. The release also states that permit given to Ibra to register a political party was cancelled on the 10 of December of 2007.
Social Liberal Party (SLP) has issued a Media Release on the 12 of this month declaring it self as a registered party in Maldives as of the 3 of this month.
The release issued by the SLP stated that the party was forced to declare itself as a registered party due to the inaction by the Commissioner of Elections to duly register the party following the submission of application for registration to Commissioner’s Office. The media release stated that article 15(b) of The 2005 Regulation on Political Parties stipulate that “ if for any reason, the Commissioner of Elections fails to inform the nominated representative of the party, seeking registration, whether the party has been registered or not as provided in the article 15(a) within 30 working days of the application of the application to be registered, the Party seeking registration, shall be considered as duly registered; and the party shall have the right to proceed with its work as a political party; and under such circumstances, Party registration documents shall be released to the nominated representative of the party”.
Further Media Release noted that dispute between the Commissioner and Liberal Party arose when the Commissioner imposed an extra legal requirement on the Party by demanding that the Party submit photocopies of National Identity Cards of some 1383 party members. The view of the Party, that the demand for the submission of the national ID cards was an extra legal requirement was supported in writing by the then Acting Attorney General, Minister of Information and Arts, Mohamed Nasheed revealed the Media Release. However, the media release points out that Commissioner ignored the legal opinion of the Attorney General.
Speaking at news conference recently Minister of Legal Reform, Information and Arts Mohamed Nasheed has said that he considers LP as a registered party and the Ibra should be given the benefit of what is not specifically mentioned in political party regulations. He elaborated that the regulations does not state that ID cards has to be furnished along with membership forms and that obtaining copies of ID cards as a verification means was procedure employed in the Commissioner’s office.
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