President Dr Mohamed Waheed has called for impartiality and political neutrality in the civil service sector of the country. The President made this statement while delivering his inaugural address at the opening ceremony of the 2nd Annual meeting of Asian Group of Public Administration. The ceremony was held at Bandos Island resort this morning.
The President noted that a non-politicised civil service system would allow for equal service to be provided to the different political segments in the society, and people who come from different political parties.
Speaking at the ceremony, the President stressed on the many challenges faced in the public service sector, with regard to the Maldives being a small society with multiple political parties.
President Waheed said that the introduction of decentralised system of governance presented with it, the issue of limited human resources that needed to be divided among a number of political parties.
“With the introduction of political parties and with this limited pool of human resources, taking membership in various, different political entities and being forced to work in a politically competitive environment; we have really created a situation where suddenly the politically correctly available pool of resources becomes drastically limited. And we are forced to bring in people who don’t necessarily fit your requirements”, said the President.
Highlighting the challenges faced in the last three years in establishing a decentralised system of government, the President noted that the National Administrative Authorities have recently been removed, in order to empower the constitutionally elected local councils at the island and atoll levels. However, the President noted, “the political affiliations of the councillors is making it very difficult for councils to function as a competitive body.”
