Dissenting Supreme Court justices challenge court’s jurisdiction to hear annulment case, evidence
09 Oct 2013, 3:43 PM
Zaheena Rasheed
The three dissenting justices in the Supreme Court’s verdict to annul the vote have challenged the apex court’s constitutional jurisdiction over the case, and the credibility of the evidence submitted by the plaintiffs.
Chief Justice Ahmed Faiz, Justice Abdulla Areef and Justice Muthasim Adnan in their verdict stated that the High Court has initial jurisdiction over election petitions as per Article 172 (a) of the Constitution.
They also challenged the credibility of statements provided by the Jumhoree Party (JP)’s 14 anonymised witnesses, and dismissed a secret police document submitted by the Attorney General Azima Shakoor as invalid evidence, since the Elections Commission (EC) was not provided a right of response to the document.
The Jumhoree Party asked the SC to annul the vote held on September 7, after its candidate Gasim Ibrahim narrowly placed third with 50,422 votes, behind Yameen Abdul Gayoom of the Progressive Party of the Maldives (PPM) who gained 53,099 votes. Maldivian Democartic Party’s Mohamed Nasheed gained 45.45 percent of the vote with 95,224 votes, while incumbent president Mohamed Waheed received just 5.13 percent.
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