Male’, Maldives – The Parliament’s Committee on Member’s Privileges and Ethics has been forwarded the issue of Health Minister Abdulla Ameen making false statements to the parliament.
Minister Ameen is accused of lying to the parliament regarding the state’s procurement of ventilators during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The matter came to light following a compliance of expenditure report by the Auditor General’s Office prepared regarding the Health Ministry. The report revealed several issues of violation of regulations, misconduct and possible corruption, due to which Minister Ameen stepped aside from his duties.
The audit report gave out that the Ministry had awarded a contract to source 75 ventilators to A Dubai based company, Executors General Trading under the pretext that it was recommended by the WHO, – something which Minister Ameen had stated in press conferences and even in a letter to the parliament.
WHO complying with the Audit Office, refuted this completely, stating that only contact information was shared by the organization and that it had made no such recommendations.
In today’s parliament session, Speaker Nasheed said that it was evident from the statements made by Auditor General Hassan Ziyath in the parliament yesterday, as well as the audit report, that Minister Ameen was untruthful in making the statements in the letter to the parliament.
“I can see that the Minister is in violation of parliament ethics, based on the audit report and the statements by the Auditor General in the Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee yesterday, after the Minister had stated so [to the parliament]” said Nasheed.
Nasheed then forwarded the matter to the parliament’s Ethics Committee to be reviewed.
Source: Sun
