Nasheed sides with Mundhu against Dr. Shaheed

22 December 2007
Report: Soodh

Legal reform Minister, Mohamed Nasheed has backed Mohamed Hussain Shareef (Mundhu) in his row with Dr. Shaheed.

In an article published in Nasheed’s own blog, he has written that Mundhu is right, cent by cent.

Dr. Shaheed has earlier said that he revealed the results on Hussan Salah’s autopsy to the media by the instructions of President Gayoom.
Refuting Dr Shaheed’s comments, Mundhu has said on Capita Radio that Shaheed reveled the results not because the president told him to do so and said that he was with Dr. Shaheed at that time.

Regarding the matter, Mohamed Nasheed has said that he was closely involved in the developing story of Hussain Solah’s post mortem and matters surrounding the discovery of his corpse. Nasheed claimed that President Maumoon, Dr Ahmed Shaheed, and Mundhu were in Singapore. Ahmed Thasmeen Ali, Dr Hassan Saeed and he were dealing with the issue here in Male’ along with few other cabinet ministers writes Nasheed in his internet blog.

Nasheed has said that three incidents come to his mind involving Dr Shaheed’s collision with the committee as regards media statements he made over events surrounding the death of Hussain Solah.

He has written that, Anni was detained due to the chaos that occurred around the cemetery. The detention was meant to be brief and only meant to ease the commotion and enforce peace in the vicinity. Dr Shaheed was reported in the Minivan News website to say that Anni would be released shortly. That killed the purpose of detaining Anni. They were unhappy with his statement.

Second issue written by Nasheed was that, Solah’s parents wanted to take him overseas for a post mortem at their expense. They decided that Solah’s body was the subject of a criminal investigation and could not be released to the family. The government would however arrange the body to be taken for a post mortem overseas at its cost if the family insisted on doing it overseas. There was a slight difference between the choice of the family and the position of the government. Family wanted the post mortem to happen overseas at their own expense. Government wanted to do it overseas in the presence of the family but at the expense of the Government. However, Dr Shaheed was reported to have broken the news that the Government had agreed to allow post mortem on Hussain Solah’s body as wanted by the parents. They had to change position because of that statement.

Thirdly, issue arose over the release of findings of the post mortem report. They knew a little while before the news hit the media about the report and its findings. They agreed not to break the news until the family had been notified and given a copy of the report. Dr Shaheed broke the news to the media and Minivan News made a curious mention in the article that it was Dr Shaheed who personally called them to give the news.

Nasheed said that they took issue with the President. The President finally instructed our High Commission in Colombo to follow the instructions of Thasmeen and not Dr Shaheed in dealing with the body of and matters relating to Hussain Solah.

Nasheed say that the President did not authorize Dr Shaheed to release that information to the media. It was agreed to have been released by Thasmeen in a meeting with the press. The President was in constant contact with Thasmeen and said that he himself was in contact with the President. Nasheed said that he was also in contact with Dr Saeed and Thasmeen every step of the way. Finally, Thasmeen, instead of giving a press briefing, gave a brief phone interview to TVM and gave up the idea of making a press statement to the media.

Regarding the matter Dr. Shaheed, “Nasheed is claiming that President did not call me, I am surprised that he made such a statement, he being a lawyer, on Dhi FM, Mundhu claimed that he was with me when President Maumoon called me, that is a big lie, when President called me somebody else was with me and he can prove me that I am not lying, Nasheed is claiming President did not call me, how would he know whether President Maumoon called me or not, it is not a statement befitting a lawyer, I told that I acted in the manner I did long before I resigned from the cabinet, I made the statement not because Dr. Hassan Saeed chose to be a presidential candidate, I made the statement in the capacity of Foreign Minister in response to questions from a Committee of the Majlis, all words will be recorded at the Majlis, Yameen was there, so was Addu Member Aslam, that day I told the committee members that my actions were based on President’s Maumoon’s instructions, he instructed me to release the report to foreign media, now my comments has become an issue, I will not accept it, I am telling you I released the information on the autopsy as instructed by the President, now if will President will release the records of calls it can be proven”.

Dr. Shahhed claimed that when Dr. Asim Maldivian High Commissioner in Colombo got the autopsy report, Dr. Asim called him and asked for his guidance. Dr. Shaheed further said that he instructed Dr. Asim to immediately call Thsameen and ask him how he should go about it.

“I told him to call Thasmeen immediately and follow his guidance, then I called the President, he told me that it should be reported to Thasmeen” said Dr. Shaheed.

Dr. Shaheed claimed that after Dr. Asim had followed what he was instructed to do, he called Dr. Shaheed and told him what was in the report. According to Dr. Sahaeed he then called Thasmeen and told him to release information regarding the report to media.

Dr. Shaheed also claimed that Thasmeen told him that it was no big deal and he would release to 8.00 pm news on TVM.
“I advised Thasmeen against holding such information, I told him a lot people already knew that autopsy was done and that report would be released; I told him that if he sit on it, people would think that government is altering it, people would think that government is altering it just like they do when results of the elections are sent to Presidential Place” said Dr. Saheed.

“When I put the phone down, President Maumoon called me and told me that the he has received information of the autopsy report and told me what was in it, he was very happy” Dr. Shaheed recollected.