Good afternoon ladies and gentle men;
It indeed is a great pleasure to be here today in Sweden. I am delighted that Anna Lindh Foundation has decided to honour us in this fashion and recognizing us for the work we are trying to do in Maldives.
Going though Anna Lindh and what she stood for, one quote stands out for me. She said, resignation is one’s greatest enemy. We will never and we should never decide to give up. In my mind this so much encapsulates the concepts and the situation that we have been going through in the Maldives during last 4 to 5 years.
We have been able to come out and come up against and win against all odds. No one, no leader, no journalist or people who were observing the Maldives ever thought we would actually win the last election and that I would actually by accepted by the people of the Maldives to be their president. That we would be able to dismantle a regime that is not only 30 years old but a culture that has been imprinted and ingrained in our society over the last so many years.
We have been able to galvanise the people to political activism. We have been able to create a space for free expression. In the process, we have been able amend our constitution, have multiparty free and fair election, and have a very smooth transfer of power. After that we’ve also been able to have a free and fair multiparty parliamentary election where we just formed our new parliament, which is also the first parliament to be, in all the sense, freely elected.
We have been able to do that because we have always understood that it won’t be easy for us to do these things. That we have to fight against the odds. I’m glad we did. I am glad that we never gave up. And I am glad that she has come to say resignation is your greatest enemy.
This is so much so now, in our fight, in facing up to the challenges of climatic change. We cannot just give up. We have to be able to fire our imagination in very many ways on how we may be able to overcome what may happen which is probably now is very certain. The science is very certain on this now on what will happen to the world. So we should and we have to find a solution. We have to find ways and means. We have to find structures on how to deal with climatic change.
Democracy is still very tender in the Maldives. It’s very young. We need to protect it. Democracy becomes so important as just highlighted here.
In our minds both mitigation and adaptation against climatic change. The adaptation measures are not in your minds just simply revetment, embankments, breakwaters, seawalls and physical infrastructure and concrete. We feel that the most important adaptation measure is good governance. People would have to be able find ways and means by themselves on how they may be able to challenge issues. We cannot just go there with a blueprint where engineers say this is how your done this is what we have to do to face the challenge.
There is a very good example here. The last government of Maldives started running an
adaptation programme. Actually out of the 198 inhabited islands in the Maldives more than 160 islands have erosion problems. Some of them to the extant that people are having to move there homes. In order to protect the islands, the former government started an adaptation programme at a cost of 200 million dollars. Now 2 years down the line the bulk of the programme is not working. It is not moving. The construction has stopped people do not want breakwaters to be in the places they are. People have decided that this is not the solution, even if it is lot of concrete. We have to be able to find ways and means where we are able to talk to people and come up with home-grown solutions.
Democracy in the Maldives is a home-grown exercise. We did it. We also feel that in terms of how we may be able to adapt to climatic change, we have to be able to talk to people of the Maldives. It is them whom we are trying to save, not our selves. Of cause our conscience. But we have to be able to find a mechanism though which we can consult with the people.
Democracy is the only form available. Developed democracies such as yours have been able very quickly adapt, very quickly come to an understanding that climatic change is an important issue that you have to face. In my mind this is more so evident in more established democracies.
So we have to be able to have good governance in the Maldives. We have to be able to have local government in the Maldives so that we can speak to the local Maldivian community. To do that we have to consolidate democracy. In your minds democracy stand at the heart of adaptation measures as well as mitigation issues. The only way to go about this is to strengthen the voice of the people.
Now standing here as a president I would say that governments can do many things. But governments only do things when people want them to do things. We have been able to change things in the Maldives because we have been bale to galvanize the people into political activism. If Europeans people or people anywhere want to get their governments to do things they will have to get here governments to act. Therefore, grassroot activities and especially vibrant democracy are so important to face up to the challenges of climatic change.
Human rights become important because, as it has been pointed out, we are talking about destruction of a civilisation. The Maldives has been there for the last 2000 years. We have a written history of 2000 years. In fact I just found out your burial grounds have cowry shells in them. So Maldivian would have come here long long time ago. So we have been around for long time. And it is quite impossible for us to believe or to comprehend, to start digesting we might not be around. We cannot accept that.
In our minds, therefore, climatic change, sea level rise and climatic aberrations are all very fundamental human rights issues. Now, it is not easy for me to say this. Free from torture, freedom of expression -- and I have been tortured twice. And to come out now and try to dilute that core human right classical definition, it is not easy, it is not an easy thing. We have to understand that there are core human rights values that we all share. Pain is a core human right value - whichever culture you come from, when you are kicked in it hurts, and when you are in solitary confinement, it is certainly not something -- I would not suggest any of you to go though any of these things.
But for us to be able to come out with solution on this -- we have to now start thinking on how we may be able safeguard these core values. In my mind to safeguarding the core human right values are so linked to, in a sense secondary issues: climatic change, poverty and so on. If we are to even protect the fundamentals, the classical idea of human rights, we have to be able to include other issues in the definition of human rights. We hope that you would understand this.
I haven’t been in power for the last thirty years, and please don’t accuse me of being a dictator yet. So this is not someone coming here and trying to find excuses for not protecting human rights and trying to dilute human rights and coming out and foisting another definition of what human right is.
Climatic change is a human rights issue because it has links to the right to life. So we feel that what is very important right now is to consolidate democracy in the Maldives.
We have very good diving instructors in the Maldives because we have good diving schools in the Maldives. But we don’t have judges because we haven’t had the rule of law. But we have a constitution that has separated powers on paper. We have a legislature that has just been composed after the parliamentary elections. After the presidential elections, we have the executive. And now it is upon the executive – myself – and the parliament to come up with a judiciary. I’m at a loss in trying to find who I should place as a chief justice, because we don’t have a culture of judging and the rule of law and basically civilised behaviour. So, there are challenges. We have to be able to find means and mechanisms where we can fill these gaps.
Now this is when we have to come to you. This is when we have to ask for assistance. We are not asking for huge amounts of aid and money. No that is not what we are asking for. In my mind our country has enough resources. If we can have proper governing systems, we can make good use of our resources. To come up with this governing system which states separation of powers and so on - it is there that we ask for your assistance. And I’m so pleased and so glad that foundations such as the Anna Lindh Foundation -- mind you, just to break away from what I’ve just been saying; in 2001 I was removed from being a member of the Parliament in the Maldives. And Anna Lindh was the Foreign Minister here at that time. She was also, I think, the European Union Chair at that time. I was so pleased to find out that she had actually written a letter to President of the Maldives to ask him for my release or leniency and so on. It is so touching. I run out of words here. It is so touching that we are recognised for this Anna is the personification of the person to represent this. I think it is speaks so well for Sweden.
We have bigger problems. We have a drug problem in the Maldives. More than 20 percent of our youth are hooked on hard drugs. There is juvenile delinquency and gang violence stemming out from this. We have rampant corruption. We have Islamic radicalism in the fringes or at least looking at us now. Maldives is a hundred percent Muslim country. We do have our share of Islamic radicalism. But the fact that the people of the Maldives decided to elect me as their President speaks a lot on where they want to have their Islamic ideals.
Before we started organising our self as a political entity, the only available room for dissent or the only available opposition were the Islamic groups. So the younger people were very rapidly driven towards that group. But since we started organising our self, it had at least checked by great amounts on who is now going towards the religious extremists.
We feel that there is a lesson here that the international community can take. You can’t bomb a country and establish liberalism and pluralism and democracy. But you can try and find home-grown solutions. And it is possible. If this can happen in the Maldives there is no reason why it can’t happen in Iran. There is no reason why it can’t happen in a number of Middle Eastern countries. In a sense, we believe that we have a blueprint for this. And it can be done. We feel that there is a need for organisations, funds, charities such as yourself to try and understand what actually did happen in the Maldives and how we may go about consolidating what is available.
One of the biggest problems that I have is what do we do with the past. I’ve been in a sense very arrogant by saying, look come on get on with it, there is a future and we have to move forward, there is no point dwelling upon the past, tomorrow is always a better day. It has worked for a certain extent. But it is not altogether working. I am under so much pressure to bring closure to many hearts. I understand that more than 15,000 Maldivians have been unfairly ill-treated during the last thirty years. And there are a number of people who wake up at night sweating with nightmares. And many loved ones – wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, uncles, aunts, girlfriends and boyfriends – are asking what is going on here. We need to talk about it. We need to somehow find a way out of it. But at the same time we want to have a thriving opposition. It is difficult in the name of justice to go on and then start prosecuting the opposition. I have believed that the democratic process would dispense justice better than the court room drama. But it is not working. People want to talk about it. People want to see what happened. And I believe that we will have to find a way, a manner in which we can address these issues.
Similarly, large sums of funds, money have vanished. There are huge gaps in many state accounts. At the same time, we have fashioned a constitution that says there should be a number of independent institutions, with the auditor general being one very important institution. Now, the auditor general has been coming up with a number of audit reports pointing his finger at the former government or some members of the former government. So, we are having to now again go along those lines if I do not assist or get the police to investigate what the auditor general is saying and pass over the sheets to the Prosecutor General. If I do not do this, I would be undermining the independent institutions.
Now, one of the main features of our constitution is separation of powers. To get these powers separated we have created another layer of independent institution to check the past. I cannot, I shouldn’t be undermining the independent institutions. At the same time, if we go ahead with prosecution, we undermine the development of a vibrant opposition. It is not so easy to build an opposition leader or a political leader. It takes time. So there is this very difficult balancing act.
Some keep telling me there is young blood in the opposition. I know there is very good young blood in the opposition. Four opposition MPs are below 26 and they are excellent. Of course, they are excellent at getting at me, but they are excellent. It takes me back fifteen years when I see them talking. I should give them the opportunity, the leverage, the channel through which they can take leadership of their party. So there are all these difficult balancing acts. And at the same time all along, we have to say resignation is our greatest enemy. We have to always keep at it. In my mind, success depends on consistency and not losing focus.
Climatic change is a grave issue. It is an issue where we have to come to grips on how to deal with it. If we don’t lose focus, if we remain at it, if we are consistent at it, I’m sure we will be able to find options, measures, procedures, and structures on how to deal with these issues.
I am sorry if I have been going on and on for too long. I didn’t intend to do that. I think we have another question and answer session.
It has been such a pleasure to be here. I like the weather. It is so melancholy. Actually I haven’t had time to reflect upon for a long time and sitting at a grand hotel looking at the canal and the castle, it has been very good medicine for me, the whole of yesterday. So it was excellent that this weather was there and not sunshine. Thank you very much. We will be there to answer your questions.
