Sunday 5 February 2012

It is the right time for opposition leaders to emerge for 2013

While joining of two Parliament members to the ruling MDP, and not to mention Ahmed Abdulla the owner of Miadhu Newspaper that commands a nationwide subscriptions are hailed as success and commemorated by the President and his party in the rain last week, this is just another untrustworthy and dishonourable act of buying people to the growing bandwagon of politically hired top heavy government.
Those who benefit the regime are only people like above who are ready to sacrifice their integrity, or what little is left of it, particularly in the case of Alhan, and of course the violent vocal die hard fans of Mohamed Nasheed’s activist movement.
For the desperate citizens of Maldives it is no surprise that we are finding a lot of Maldivian’s looking for financial privileges and social positions keep joining the MDP and Nasheed regardless of what has become of the country, and the people under the MDP/Nasheed established authoritarian rule.
However still in our country the fact that it is only a handful that sacrifice their morals and integrity to join the MDP government and President Nasheed indicates that we have patriots, educated skilled patriots that are willing to withstand this bad omen. Even though they are unemployed struggling to make ends meet, those of us with employments their employments are getting taken away on a daily basis, or their salaries are getting reduced to meagre levels, the fact the MDP and Mohamed Nasheed could not call themselves the largest party with most members(despite of their membership drives) indicate we have an entire nation looking for alternatives. More than that this tells us that the Maldivian people do not want to compromise their integrity because they still have hope, hope for the future.
The entire nation is looking for an alternative and people like Alhan Fahmy and Ahmed Abdulla do not count.
The opposition political parties need to get people rally behind them and this is the time to do so. Opposition parties and leaders need to mobilise on the hope people still holds for their future despite of their economic sufferings and social tragedies.
The Maldivian middle class and lower class marginalised by the government, the hardest hit by the economic deprivations of this government are desperately looking for alternatives.
Misguided policies of the MDP and Nasheed borrowed from the British Conservatives will never fit the Maldives political, economic and social scene, therefore are a failure and bound to fail for the next three years of their power. Therefore the opposition parties that can inspire the people and utilise on the people’s hopes will win. It does not matter how many Parliament members or media moguls like Ahmed Abdulla; running out of options and running out of favours join the MDP. The MDP and Nasheed has starved the nation long enough for people to realise what they are like and they will not succeed with their persecutions and deprivations of our middle class and lower class citizens and the island communities. Governing based on power, authoritarian rule has politically failed the MDP and Nasheed for good.
All the other political parties, even though MDP is in power have the upper hand. Right now they have to utilise it. Inside locally, and most importantly by establishing relations with the neighbouring countries and extending diplomatic relations with other countries and financial institutions. The Maldivian political parties can get the backing and acquire the power they need to get out of the current hibernation. They could be up and running within months if they want to.
Bilateral relations with the outside world is not an exclusive privilege of the regime. If we look at the MDP’s political past, the truth is out there for all of us to see. MDP was not even a movement, just a group of ex-prisoners and a few cyber dissidents who got lucky with the British Conservatives. They only became a party and were able to hoodwink the Maldivian people and our political parties to vote them to power, because of the relations they have had with the British Conservatives.
Finding opportunities to optimise inside and outside dynamics for our opposition parties at the moment is of immense important. There are philanthropists, international organisations that help political parties to secure democracy in their countries and help them to successfully come to power.
If we look at the MDP, the British Conservatives used the financial and strategic help given by the Westminster Foundation for Democracy to get the MDP up and running.
The Westminster Foundation for Democracy and its funding can be secured by any party. The opposition political parties and leaders can affiliate themselves with powerful political parties from other countries, even governments, organisations such as the Westminster Foundation for Democracy to build themselves and emerge as alternatives for 2013.
The MDP and Nasheed although at the moment are taking the coffers home for themselves and for their loyalists from within and outside, they will start spending on the people to secure power in 2013.
Before they start doing so the other parties have to emerge and mobilise their strength. Build themselves as alternatives when the MDP and Mohamed Nasheed are proving to be an example of the biggest failure of democratic transition that has ever taken place.

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