EPA Director General approved for voluntary redundancy three weeks before sudden departure

Zuhair resigned publicly stating that his departure was due to “political interference” in the EPA’s fining of local business tycoon Mohamed ‘Champa’ Moosa – the owner of opposition-leaning private broadcaster DhiTV – for conducting dredging and reclamation works around Thun’bafushi without an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).

Photos obtained by Minivan News, corroborated by the eyewitness accounts of foreign experts, suggested that Thun’bafushi had been used as a dump site, with piles of old machinery, oil drums and used car batteries rusting in the sun. At the time the photos were taken, a number of sharks were also being kept in a concrete tank containing less than a foot of tepid water.

The EPA labelled Champa an “environmental criminal” and fined him the maximum penalty of Rf100 million (US$6.5 million) after the EPA assessed damage to the area as amounting to Rf2,230,293,566 (US$144.6 million), under new enforcement regulation introduced in February.