[Demonstration Majeedhee Magu Male’ – image by author]

Maldives President Quits After Police Mutiny, Protests

“President Mohamed Nasheed of the Maldives, widely credited with bringing democracy to the Indian Ocean archipelago, has resigned after weeks of opposition protests erupted into a police mutiny and what an aide said amounted to a coup.  Nasheed, the Sunni Muslim nation’s first democratically elected president, handed power to Vice-President, Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik, and said that continuing in office would result in his having to use force against the people.  Protests last year over the faltering economy and scrambling ahead of this year’s presidential election have seen parties adopting hard-line Islamist rhetoric and accusing Nasheed of being anti-Islamic.  Britain’s Foreign Office said a team of diplomats was on its way to the Maldives and that London viewed developments ‘with concern’ and called on all groups ‘to find a peaceful way through these difficulties, in accordance with the Constitution.’”

[Reuters, 2012]