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Morning Brief

Fallout continues from Supreme Court purge

A digest of yesterday's top story.

27 Feb, 9:00 AM

Good morning. Today we’re examining the fallout from yesterday's dramatic reduction of the Supreme Court bench, a watershed moment that has been widely condemned as an assault on judicial independence. In other news, we have no-bid procurement rules, parliament deferring a decision on banning Israeli passports and electric vehicle charging stations.
   
The downsizing of the Supreme Court bench and suspension of three justices triggered an immediate backlash across legal and political circles, prompting fears of democratic backsliding and accusations of executive overreach.
Shortly after parliament pushed through the controversial legal changes, the Judicial Service Commission announced the suspension of Justices Husnu Suood, Mahaz Ali Zahir and Azmirelda Zahir, citing notification from the anti-corruption watchdog of a criminal investigation.
The Anti-Corruption Commission defended its role later on Wednesday. The independent body has a legal responsibility to probe complaints of alleged corruption “without exempting anyone,” the five-member commission said in a statement, assuring the public that “cases submitted to and being investigated by this commission will proceed without yielding to anyone’s influence and without bias toward any particular party.” 
The suspensions came 10 minutes before the Supreme Court was due to resume hearings on a constitutional challenge to anti-defection rules that empowered parties to unseat lawmakers at will. The hearing was subsequently canceled as the full bench must preside over constitutional cases. 
According to media reports, an emergency JSC meeting had been called at the behest of the attorney general with notice of only 13 minutes, which prevented judges on the commission from attending. The 10-member oversight body is composed of three representatives each from the executive, legislature and judiciary along with a lawyer elected to represent the legal profession.
“They claim that ACC is investigating a case. But they haven't said which case is being investigated," a Supreme Court justice told Adhadhu. "The ACC is investigating the case in order to influence the court. We don't even know what case is being investigated. The ACC is investigating the cases unlawfully," the online outlet quoted a second justice as saying.
Justices Azmirelda and Mahaz are under investigation by the JSC over alleged interference to free the former’s husband from police custody, Dhauru reported. Last week, Dr Ismail Latheef, an anaesthesiologist at IGMH, denied alleged influence from Justice Azmirelda for his release following an arrest in December during a raid of a spa suspected of operating as a brothel. 
The Prosecutor General’s office decided not to pursue solicitation charges, it emerged on Tuesday. But Latheef has since accused Home Minister Ali Ihusan of orchestrating his arrest and conducting a smear campaign to use as leverage against Justice Azmirelda. 
The JSC is also investigating an ethical complaint against Justice Suood, who is reportedly accused of speaking inappropriately to High Court Assistant Registrar Hussain Mohamed Hanif during a summons to the Supreme Court on October 25, 2022.  
Here’s a roundup of the reactions from the opposition and the legal profession: 

At a press conference on Wednesday afternoon, Ali Hussain, a former lawmaker and the petitioner in the legal challenge against the new constitutional prohibition on floor-crossing, accused the government-controlled watchdog of “manufacturing” ethical cases as a pretext to impeach Supreme Justice justices. “They are creating cases out of thin air by using ACC and JSC to suspend judges…They are working to remove judges by creating non-existent cases. We believe the evidence will also be fabricated," he told the press.

Mahfooz Saeed, the lead counsel on the constitutional challenge, suggested that both parliament and the JSC have been stacked with “yes men who will obey the president's orders.”He added: “We say that our system has separation of powers between the three powers of the state, but all the principles for this separation have been torn down."

Fayyaz Ismail, chairman of the main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party, announced a series of protests and invited all political parties, civil society organizations, and democracy advocates to join. “What is operating in the Maldives right now is an unlawful state, and especially, the entire system of governance has been demolished,” he said.

The Maldives Bar Council expressed grave concern and urged President Dr Mohamed Muizzu not to ratify the bench reduction bill. “The amendment to the Maldives Judicature Act passed by the parliament is unconstitutional, violating articles 148, 149, and 154 of the constitution as well as constitutional and legal principles,” the Bar Council said.

“Judges can be removed if they commit an act unbecoming of a judge or if they lack the capability for the post. There is no legal principle for removing judges in the name of reducing the number of judges,” former prosecutor general Ahmed Muizzu tweeted.

“When a totalitarian or an oppressive regime begins to disregard popular sovereignty, it is inevitably writing its own demise,” former chief justice Dr Ahmed Abdulla Didi observed. 

“It takes a diamond to cut a diamond," former attorney general Fathmath Dhiyana advised, “If the courts are not free, there’s no need for us lawyers to go to court. The whole Bar Council’s operation should be temporarily voluntarily suspended.” 

Former attorney general Dr Ahmed Ali Sawad. 
Former lawmaker and presidential candidate Faris Maumoon.
Hamza Latheef, a prominent lawyer and commentator who has argued constitutional cases before the Supreme Court.
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