Malé, Maldives – President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih has expressed his views opposing the establishment of a Parliamentary system in the Maldives, and has called for the withdrawal of the resolution.
In a special interview to local media outlet ‘Raajje TV’ today, President Solih explicitly expressed that he is not in favour of a Parliamentary system for the Maldives, and revealed that he has already requested the withdrawal of the resolution put forth by Speaker of the Parliament and President of Maldives Democratic Party (MDP) to it’s congress scheduled for this Friday.
He further added that he does not believe that the resolution would be passed by the congress, explaining that Maldives is still too “young” for a Parliamentary system right now.
While this is so, Nasheed continues to further his campaign to change the political system of the country to a Parliamentary one. He has now commenced discussions at MDP offices to the effect as well.
Nasheed’s proposed amendment to the constitution states that the head of government would be the Prime Minister elected by the Parliament Members, and that the head of the state would be the President elected via presidential election.
Nasheed also calls to determine in the constitution, the powers of the head of state and the powers and responsibilities of the President when the Prime Minister runs the country, as well as the representation of Parliamentary constituencies and the formulation of a “National List” of members based on the votes secured by parties in the Parliamentary elections.
Further, he also proposes to limit the number of Parliament member at a maximum of 87 and to determine that the government will be run by a Cabinet of Minister appointed among the Parliament Members. He also proposes to determine that the number of Supreme Court Justices be limited to 5.
Other proposed amendments include the determination of changes to be made to the structure of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), and to include the basic characteristics of the Decentralisation Act of Maldives in the constitution.
