Here’s another white elephant that’s going to get your knickers in a twist.
5 to 8 laari out of every rufiyaa we earn is spent on our Defence Ministry. It’s little wonder some estimates place the Maldives next only to Israel in terms of military spending as a percentage of GDP.
Its been over a year since Gayoom’s government, often alleged by opponents to be a police state, was voted out in the first multiparty elections that catapulted Nasheed, the most vociferous advocate of human rights and democracy this country ever produced, to the country’s highest office.
I for one believed the end of ‘the police state’ and heralding of democracy would inevitably ease military spending freeing up resources for the more urgent priorities.
My optimism is short-lived. The first democratically elected Government of Maldives spent a staggering Rf 613million, up Rf41million from Gayoom’s final year, during its first year. And over the medium term the trend is all set to continue unabated.
On Wikipedia’s list of countries by military expenditure as a percentage of GDP, the Maldives placed on the 15th seems to be somewhat of an oddity. No one would have raised an eyebrow if the Maldives is an oil rich Arab state or we had a history of armed conflicts.
Now, for the biggest and the most controversial question: does a country the size and nature of Maldives need to spend such vast sums of money on maintaining this disproportionately large army to thwart a make-believe threat?
The world’s richest country Liechtenstein, with a per capita income a whopping 30 times more than ours, has no armed forces. Mauritius with a population four times that of the Maldives and a per capita income of over USD 12thousand doesn’t have one either. Andorra, Costa Rica, Dominica, Marshall islands, Monaco, Panama, St Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, Samoa, Solomon islands, Tuvalu, Vanuatu are all independent states that, to my reckoning, aren’t very different from the Maldives that are managing the affairs of their statehood with no standing army.
Finally, here’s the saddest part of the story. Our finance minister embroiled in a frivolous conspiracy theory about our CSC seems to be totally oblivious to this colossal white elephant we are keeping mostly to attend to rather mundane affairs of statehood such as, ahem, keeping rodent infestations at bay. ;-)
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Islam: A costly affair in the Maldives
Islamic Affairs Ministry has a budget of Rf 211million – that’s twice as much as we are spending on tourism, information and arts and a whopping 14 times more than what we are spending on economic development!
How on earth is the Islamic Ministry spending all the money? Rf 160million on recurrent expenditures and 51million on capital expenditure, says the Ministry’s budget.
The Public Sector Investment Programme for 2010 shows Government plans spend Rf50million to build mosques in some 36 different locations in the country. Here’s an example of some islands that are going to get brand new mosques in 2010.
The 700 odd residents of Dh. Badidhoo are getting a mosque at a cost of Rf1.2million.
R. Fainu, home to some 300 odd people are getting a mosque valued at Rf1.7million.
R. Dhuvaafaru, home to around 2000 people is getting 2 mosques – one that costs Rf0.58million and another at Rf 4.4 million.
Who prays in these mosques? Men, to be more precise, men too old to travel to resorts or Male for work. How about women? They pray at home.
Now, the question of cost. I know how easily I could be labelled as ‘an atheist, gay, Jewish, Christian missionary’ for saying this. But lets think about the Fainu mosque case: building a mosque at a cost of Rf1.7 million in Fainu is like giving Rf30,000 to every adult male in the island to pray. It simply defies all my logic. I simply cannot understand the rationale of our policy makers to ‘invest’ Rf 50million of mostly borrowed money to build fancy mosques in small island communities the harsh demographic and geographical realities of which often compel its residents to travel to a neighbouring island for the even most common tablet of painkillers.
I’ve always been told Prophet's mosque in Madinah was constructed entirely from date palm – palm tree trunk pillars and palm fronds roof, no minaret and no dome. Islam, as I have understood all my life, is all for virtues like modesty and simplicity.
This got me seriously baffled. Utterly confused. Confused as to the need of a small island community that defecate into holes dug, as-and-when-nature-calls, on public beaches and ‘four-gear’ latrines to pray in a mosque that has a shining dome, a tall minaret and intricate wood carvings of Quranic verses on the walls. It looks like Islam indeed is an expensive affair in this country.
How on earth is the Islamic Ministry spending all the money? Rf 160million on recurrent expenditures and 51million on capital expenditure, says the Ministry’s budget.
The Public Sector Investment Programme for 2010 shows Government plans spend Rf50million to build mosques in some 36 different locations in the country. Here’s an example of some islands that are going to get brand new mosques in 2010.
The 700 odd residents of Dh. Badidhoo are getting a mosque at a cost of Rf1.2million.
R. Fainu, home to some 300 odd people are getting a mosque valued at Rf1.7million.
R. Dhuvaafaru, home to around 2000 people is getting 2 mosques – one that costs Rf0.58million and another at Rf 4.4 million.
Who prays in these mosques? Men, to be more precise, men too old to travel to resorts or Male for work. How about women? They pray at home.
Now, the question of cost. I know how easily I could be labelled as ‘an atheist, gay, Jewish, Christian missionary’ for saying this. But lets think about the Fainu mosque case: building a mosque at a cost of Rf1.7 million in Fainu is like giving Rf30,000 to every adult male in the island to pray. It simply defies all my logic. I simply cannot understand the rationale of our policy makers to ‘invest’ Rf 50million of mostly borrowed money to build fancy mosques in small island communities the harsh demographic and geographical realities of which often compel its residents to travel to a neighbouring island for the even most common tablet of painkillers.
I’ve always been told Prophet's mosque in Madinah was constructed entirely from date palm – palm tree trunk pillars and palm fronds roof, no minaret and no dome. Islam, as I have understood all my life, is all for virtues like modesty and simplicity.
This got me seriously baffled. Utterly confused. Confused as to the need of a small island community that defecate into holes dug, as-and-when-nature-calls, on public beaches and ‘four-gear’ latrines to pray in a mosque that has a shining dome, a tall minaret and intricate wood carvings of Quranic verses on the walls. It looks like Islam indeed is an expensive affair in this country.
Monday, February 15, 2010
Looking for info on Govt’s websites
This morning while having a chat with a friend I became a little curious on the corporate entities in which our Government holds shares. After a bit of googling which proved to be all abortive, I thought our Finance Ministry’s website would be the best place to start with. So I typed the all too familiar www.finance.gov.mv on my keyboard and got in to the Ministry’s website.
On the front page are what appear to be a hodgepodge of links to some downloads. The first one entitled “2010 Budget aai behey Circular” took me to an announcement on the lease of properties owned by the Government. The second one with a title “Galolhu Bolha Dhadu 12 No.Fihaara Kuyah Dhinun” as the title says was about leasing a shop lot owned by the Government at Galolhu stadium. This is followed by an umpteen number of unsorted ad-hoc announcements on similar matters I presume are related to providing “the country with a sound macroeconomic framework that leads to sustained growth, with the use of sustainable, non-inflationary fiscal policy” – the noble ‘mission’ of Finance Ministry.
I tried the heading “affiliated institutes” which, for some strange reason known only to the webmaster, listed only MMA, Customs, DIR, BML, HDFC, TEB, PEMEB. HDFC and BML can’t possibly be the only corporate entities in which Government of Maldives has stakes. But then when I saw the last tab titled ‘PEMEB’ – an acronym that incidentally rings a bell of nostalgia of my days at MMA ;-) - I thought I finally found the information I was looking for. Alas, the link is dead!
Then I decided to try my luck with the sitemap to see if that would ease my navigation through the seemingly indomitable labyrinth. Tough luck, again. Its another dead link!
My curiosity with the dead links took me to a tab titled “Minister’s Bureau” that appear to have become extinct perhaps not too long after the last archaeopteryx flew the Earth. Then, I finally noticed the little ‘FEEDBACK’ tab on which I wrote a little note about my problem.
My search eventually took me to a PDF document entitled “Government Offices and Independent Institutions” on the website of the President’s Office. But that was of no help either.
Finally, after almost 45 minutes of googling, navigating through websites of several Government offices and writing small notes that would perhaps only be ‘read’ by BOTs, I’m still left clueless as to how many corporate entities are there in which the Government of my country holds stakes.
On the front page are what appear to be a hodgepodge of links to some downloads. The first one entitled “2010 Budget aai behey Circular” took me to an announcement on the lease of properties owned by the Government. The second one with a title “Galolhu Bolha Dhadu 12 No.Fihaara Kuyah Dhinun” as the title says was about leasing a shop lot owned by the Government at Galolhu stadium. This is followed by an umpteen number of unsorted ad-hoc announcements on similar matters I presume are related to providing “the country with a sound macroeconomic framework that leads to sustained growth, with the use of sustainable, non-inflationary fiscal policy” – the noble ‘mission’ of Finance Ministry.
I tried the heading “affiliated institutes” which, for some strange reason known only to the webmaster, listed only MMA, Customs, DIR, BML, HDFC, TEB, PEMEB. HDFC and BML can’t possibly be the only corporate entities in which Government of Maldives has stakes. But then when I saw the last tab titled ‘PEMEB’ – an acronym that incidentally rings a bell of nostalgia of my days at MMA ;-) - I thought I finally found the information I was looking for. Alas, the link is dead!
Then I decided to try my luck with the sitemap to see if that would ease my navigation through the seemingly indomitable labyrinth. Tough luck, again. Its another dead link!
My curiosity with the dead links took me to a tab titled “Minister’s Bureau” that appear to have become extinct perhaps not too long after the last archaeopteryx flew the Earth. Then, I finally noticed the little ‘FEEDBACK’ tab on which I wrote a little note about my problem.
My search eventually took me to a PDF document entitled “Government Offices and Independent Institutions” on the website of the President’s Office. But that was of no help either.
Finally, after almost 45 minutes of googling, navigating through websites of several Government offices and writing small notes that would perhaps only be ‘read’ by BOTs, I’m still left clueless as to how many corporate entities are there in which the Government of my country holds stakes.
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Back to blogosphere
The blogger in me has hibernated for over nine months now. Visitors to this blog and my friends have at times questioned me about my long absence. For those of you out there who want to know, here’s what I have to say.
Firstly, I got busy preparing for my daughter Anna’s arrival.
Secondly, I felt that I was making unnecessary enemies. We have a culture in which all criticisms are taken as personal attacks. Even the slightest criticism could precipitate a totally unwarranted flurry of rabid animosity on you.
Thirdly, I guess I just got sick and tired of crying wolf all the time. Visitors to this blog were accusing me of being too cynical in my outlook.
Then, I thought of taking a break. I thought of just waiting for something positive to happen so that I could write a nice and happy blog post about it. So I went into hibernation at the end of April 2009.
After two months or so I had a look at the major events on the international front to see if there was anything positive I could write about. Many things of course did happen during my absence. But there was nothing that could even remotely be described as positive - H1N1 assumed pandemic status; Ahmedinejad got re-elected in Iran; Air France flight from Rio to Paris crashed killing all 228 people on board; the legendary King of Pop died; and Chinese authorities clamped down on ethnic Uyghurs. :-(
On the domestic front things were going from bad to worse. Amidst the acrimonious political bickering on both sides of the political divide there was little the few ‘good’ elements in the country could do to remedy an economic, social and political situation that had spiralled out of control. And finally, the day my country bloated its Majlis from 48 rabblerousing ‘ikhlastheri’ members to 77, I buried whatever remains of my hope to write a blog post on anything positive.
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