Long-awaited housing list released with majority of recipients disqualified

Only 1,820 out of 4,939 chosen applicants passed a verification process, Muththalib revealed at a press conference. Of the disqualified applications, 2,695 were deemed ineligible upon re-evaluation and 424 applications fell below the eligibility threshold with revised lower scores. 

As such, 53 percent of chosen recipients “have been excluded through this process and designated as those who will not get flats,” Muththalib said. But the disqualified applicants will have one month to submit complaints, he added. 

The government only reviewed applications from the chosen recipients, Muththalib stressed. New recipients will be chosen after reviewing the remaining applications, he said. 

There were more than 20,600 applications when the Maldivian Democratic Party government’s flagship Gedhoruveriya scheme , of whom 15,046 were deemed eligible. Qualification required applicants to score at least 73 points and 76 points, respectively, for two-bedroom and three-bedroom apartments. 

Ahead of the September 2023 presidential election, former president Ibrahm Mohamed Solih assured housing for all eligible applicants. The final list of recipients of the first 4,000 units were announced a month before the polls. The apartments from 32 towers under construction in Hulhumalé at the time were to be leased under a rent-to-own model. 

But over 60 percent of the approved applications were ineligible, the Anti-Corruption Commission found during the transition period before the change of government in November 2023. A re-evaluation process undertaken by the new administration faced multiple delays and several deadlines for publication passed before today’s announcement. 

The verified list was gazetted after Muththalib’s press briefing. The published list only notes specific eligibility criteria that an applicant failed to meet. Applicants can log into the Gedhoruverin portal for details on the reasons for their disqualification, Muththalib said.

The verification process involved confirming eligibility under the scheme's criteria and ensuring that applicants scored above the points threshold. Supporting documents were also checked against instructions included in the Gedhoruverin online submission portal, he said.

According to the eligibility criteria, applicants must be adult Maldivian citizens with at least 15 consecutive years of residency in Malé who do not earn a monthly income exceeding MVR 60,000 (US$ 3,890) and do not own or stand to inherit a plot of land larger than 600 square feet in the Greater Malé Region.

The main reason for disqualification was failure to prove uninterrupted residency in the capital since 2007.

"Most applicants for this scheme were people who had migrated to Malé from their islands and had either changed their registry to Malé or had been living in Malé for a long time,” Muththalib explained, noting the challenges for providing documentary evidence.

In many cases, the previous government accepted dubious documents during the complaints period to unfairly qualify applicants, Muththalib alleged. 

Questionable documents included letters from homes in Malé (27 percent) and letters issued by the Malé City Council (13 percent) as proof of residency. But the city council lacked the means to verify residency during the stated period, Muththalib contended.

Eight percent of applicants submitted no documents or provided false employment letters despite holding government jobs on their native islands, the minister said.

Muththalib said the government tried to be as lenient as possible, exempting time spent outside of Malé for periods of less than one year for studies, work obligations, or medical treatment.

"We tried to carry out this process and interpret this so that the least number of people will be removed from the list,” he said.

Notable cases flagged by the minister: 

The government will begin handing over apartments from the completed tower blocks by March, Muththalib said.  Rents needed to be collected to finance repayments to the Indian Exim Bank, he said.

The minister announced substantial increases to the rates set by the former administration, with two-bedroom apartments now priced at MVR 6,000 (up from MVR 5,000) and three-bedroom units at MVR 9,000 (up from MVR 7,000), inclusive of higher maintenance fees of MVR 1,000 and MVR 1,500 respectively. New security deposits of MVR 15,000 and MVR 25,000 will also be required.

Muththalib insisted the previous rent were unfair and not based on proper assessments. The full cost recovery would actually require charging MVR 9,000 for two-bedroom and MVR 13,000 for three-bedroom apartments, he said.