The great neutrality myth: MDP chairperson never meant to run presidential primaries

As things heat up in the Maldivian Democratic Party’s (MDP) chairperson election, one word has suddenly become fashionable: impartiality. 

Leading the charge is MP Meekail Ahmed Naseem — former President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih’s chosen candidate — who has repeatedly argued that an MDP chairperson cannot administer a free and fair presidential primary if he or she openly supports a particular candidate.

At face value, this sounds perfectly reasonable. If the person running an election has already picked a side, naturally questions arise about fairness.

There is only one small problem with this argument: the MDP chairperson does not run the presidential primary.

According to article 61 (a) of MDP’s standing orders, the presidential primary is conducted not by the chairperson, but by a five-member committee selected by the party’s National Council (Gaumee Majlis). This was precisely the system used for the 2023 presidential primary between President Mohamed Nasheed and President Solih. This was how the presidential primaries of 2008, 2013 and 2018 were also held.

The entire process was intentionally designed to insulate presidential primaries from the party’s elected leadership, including the chairperson, because the MDP’s drafters understood the reality of competitive party politics. In any major political party, likely contenders for a presidential primary are almost always individuals already occupying senior leadership positions within the party itself; presidents, vice presidents, chairpersons and senior figures. 

It would therefore be absurd to expect the chairperson to somehow exist outside politics while simultaneously occupying one of the most political positions within the party.

And because facts are stubborn things, it is worth revisiting how the 2023 presidential primary committee itself was formed.

In December 2022, the MDP National Council convened to appoint the five-member committee responsible for administering the presidential primary. President Nasheed’s faction proposed what was, by any reasonable standard, a balanced compromise: two members nominated by Nasheed, two nominated by Solih and one mutually agreed upon by both camps. Yet the proposal was rejected.

Instead, then-Henveiru Dhekunu MP Hussain Shaheem, aligned with Solih’s faction and seconded by Maradhoo MP Ibrahim Shareef, proposed a committee consisting of Anas Abdul Sattar, Ahmed Abdulla Afeef, Akram Kamaludeen, Mohamed Eman and Ibrahim Waheed.

Following heated debate, largely driven by concerns from Nasheed’s faction regarding fairness and impartiality, Nasheed’s camp walked out. The vote proceeded. The committee was approved. Curiously, many of the people now sermonising about neutrality appeared perfectly comfortable with that arrangement at the time.

The reality is that the MDP’s standing orders already anticipated these tensions years ago. That is precisely why the chairperson was never made the administrator of presidential primaries in the first place. Yet suddenly, in the middle of a heated internal election, we are asked to believe that the chairperson must function as some kind of politically sterilised referee floating above factional politics. This is an entirely invented standard.

A chairperson is not an ombudsperson, not a judge and certainly not a politically neutral civil servant. The chairperson is an elected political office bearer whose role is inherently political.

Some, including a report published by Dhauru, have attempted to invoke Article 48 of the MDP’s standing orders to argue otherwise. The article states that “Secretariat employees shall not declare support and work with candidates contesting in any of the party’s internal elections, as party secretariat employees are expected to serve all party members with fairness.” In this hit piece Dhauru editor Moosa Latheef argues that this provision somehow prohibits the chairperson from endorsing a candidate.

But this interpretation collapses almost immediately upon basic reading of the article itself. The chairperson is not “a secretariat employee”. The chairperson is an elected political office bearer chosen by party members.

Ironically, if Article 48 genuinely applies to anyone in this election, it appears far more relevant to Meekail Ahmed Naseem’s own mother, Mariyam Zubair (Mandhy), a secretariat staff member who reportedly took temporary leave to actively campaign for her son.

The standing orders do not appear to contain any clause allowing secretariat employees to temporarily suspend impartiality obligations during election season and then simply resume office afterward. The wording is straightforward. Secretariat employees cannot campaign in internal elections. Not “cannot campaign unless on leave.” Not “cannot campaign temporarily.” Simply cannot campaign.

If the standard is to be applied seriously, then it must be applied consistently.

And while neutrality is being discussed so passionately, perhaps it is also worth acknowledging the obvious: Meekail Ahmed Naseem himself is not politically neutral. His campaign is openly backed, financed, staffed and politically powered by President Solih’s faction.

He is surrounded by Solih loyalists and family members, including former MP Ali Niyaz (Solih’s own brother), former First Lady Fazna Ahmed, and ultimately Solih himself — who is currently touring major population centres urging MDP members to vote for Meekail.

To now present Meekail as some kind of detached institutional guardian of neutrality requires an impressive level of political imagination.

The football referee analogy repeatedly used by Meekail’s campaign is therefore unintentionally amusing. They ask: how can a football match be fair if the referee has already chosen a team? Fair question. But another question naturally follows: what happens if the referee himself is selected, funded, promoted and politically carried by one particular team? Does that suddenly become neutrality? Or does neutrality only become important when it is electorally convenient?

Ultimately, the entire argument rests on a false premise: that the MDP chairperson is meant to function as a neutral electoral umpire. That has never been the purpose of the position.

Reducing the role of chairperson to that of an election administrator is not merely inaccurate; it is a profoundly reductionist understanding of a fundamentally political office. Promising impartiality in this context is therefore not only impractical. It is political theatre.

And not particularly convincing theatre at that.

              

Saif Fathih is a columnist at the Maldives Independent and a former member of the Malé City Council for Galolhu North. With his educational background in communications, international studies and public policy, he previously worked as a journalist, editor and public policy advisor, with roles including senior policy director at the ministry of national planning and editor of Ocean Weekly Magazine. Saif began his career as a radio producer and presenter at Minivan Radio, writer for Minivan Daily, and translator for the British High Commission and the European Union Mission to Sri Lanka and the Maldives. He is also the host of Ithuru Vaahaka, the Maldives Independent podcast.