“PA MPs decide they were unable to continue working within the DRP coalition, as they were not receiving support from the DRP,” said the PA’s acting Secretary General Ahmed Musthafa.

“The PA’s Council and MPs felt that [DRP leader] Ahmed Thasmeen Ali’s faction was not cooperating with the PA. The Z-DRP faction also urged us to break the coalition agreement,” Musthafa said.

The Z-DRP is a faction of the DRP affiliated with former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, which split from the party following the DRP Disciplinary Committee’s decision to oust then Deputy Leader Umar Naseer.

Musthafa added that the party was not yet sure how the decision to break the coalition would affect the opposition’s narrow operating majority in parliament, “although we will still be working with opposition MPs and the Z-DRP.”

The decision would require that the committee allocation decision in parliament, which resulted in parliamentary deadlocks last week and ultimately the removal of disruptive Z-DRP MPs by the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF), be revisted, Musthafa said.

DRP MP Dr Abdulla Mausoom told Minivan News that the PA’s breaking of the coalition agreement would “break the hearts” of the DRP’s support base in constituencies with a PA MP.

“In the Majlis election [the PA] in Meemu and Laamu Atoll asked for DRP support. These [constituencies] have a huge DRP support base and people there will be very uncertain because of today’s decision. They are very loyal to the DRP but voted for the PA tag,” Dr Mausoom said.

He suggested that the PA’s decision “could be a way for those people with discontent about the committee allocation [in parliament] to bring the issue back to the table.”

Dr Mausoom declined to speculate on whether there was now potential for the formation of new coalition between the Z-DRP and the PA, but did make one observation: “I think this is the beginning of the road to 2013.”