Media rights violations are escalating in Maldives

Naaif Ahmed, Secretary general MJA

With the presidential election in September this year, the political tensions in the Maldives are increasing. Amid the turmoil, there is an escalating trend of attacks and threats towards media workers, especially journalists.

Under the European Commission funded project, ‘Stronger media for stronger democracy’ Maldives Journalists Association (MJA) with support from the International

Federation of Journalists (IFJ) is closely monitoring media rights violations in the Maldives.

Rights Violations in Maldives:

·2023 (until 23 March) – 8 cases

·2022 – 6 cases

·2021 – 6 cases

·2020 - 1 case

According to the data, eight cases have been reported in the first two months of 2023. This is even higher than what has been reported in the whole of 2022. These figures show that with the upcoming presidential elections, the political atmosphere in the country is volatile, with that media rights violations are escalating. We forecast that the number of cases will continue to increase in the coming months, leading to an all-time high.

"If the restrictions on the work of journalists continue to intensify, this will be a challenging year for press freedom in the country," said Ali Rifshan, president of MJA.

The most common type of cases reported this year were online threats against journalists, following by police brutality against journalists.

Type of media rights violations:

•Online threats: 2 issues

•Online harassment: 2 cases

•Police brutality/obstruction: 2 cases against the negligent police officers. The National Integrity Commission has not yet taken any action on such a case.

Although threats, intimidation and harassment against journalists through various social media platforms are increasing in Maldives, the police could not successfully investigate any of these cases. Most cases are shelved, or sometimes the police have asked journalists to withdraw such cases. Police have not yet completed a single investigation into any of the media rights violations. This shows the lack of seriousness of the police in investigating cases of media rights violation.

"If the threats to journalists are taken so lightly, it is an indirect encouragement to those who do such things. Perpetrators have the assurance that the law will not reach them. Nothing will happen to them," Rifshan said.

Women journalists have been the victims of online harassment and they keep suffering. Both of the online harassment cases reported this year involved a female journalist. And last year it was the same. Some people have systematically carried out campaigns to defame and humiliate a woman journalist on the basis of an article written by her.

Journalists also face threats from gangs and religious extremists. As a result, journalists are reluctant to write and express their opinions on major issues in society. Journalists in Maldives have to be confined to self-censorship under forced circumstances.

Recently, a similar serious threat has been reported. The chief editor and all journalists of ‘Adhadhu’ received death threats via SMS after they published a story related to gangs and religious extremists.

Hasan Mohamed, managing editor of Adhadhu, took to Twitter to express his views on the incident, saying: “Newspapers are in self-censorship. They are frightened to write about gangs, extremism. If the journalists write about them, they are in great danger. When they reported the threats, police did not investigate. I believe it is the responsibility of the state to protect journalism and journalists.”

It states that only journalists working for a registered newspaper will be allowed to cover the election, if the amendment is passed, foreign journalists and freelance journalists will lose the opportunity to cover the presidential election. As of now there is no system for registering journalists in Maldives, it would be difficult to implement a system within the short time for only registered journalists to cover the election. This will prevent journalists from covering the elections.

In addition, newspapers hire hundreds of volunteers to cover election results, but there are concerns that changes to the law will deprive the use of volunteers to monitor elections and bring the timely results.

“The issue of impunity should end.”

In addition, there have been many cases of police brutality and injuries to journalists covering the protests. Such cases were not investigated by the police through their internal policies and no action was taken

The work of journalists in Maldives is being hampered from all sides. With less than six months to go for the presidential election, the government has proposed an amendment to the General Elections Act that would make it difficult for journalists to cover the election.

"While there were no complaints about the manner in which journalists were allowed in previous elections, and this did not hamper the election process, the union believes that trying to bring about such changes at this juncture, there is an ulterior motive by the government," MJA president Rifshan said.

"The union demands that the proposed amendments be withdrawn."

We need to step up our efforts to provide a safe and secure environment for journalists. Such issues should not be taken as routine issues, but they should be taken as very serious. Especially with the upheavaged politics of the presidential election, the need to step up efforts to protect journalists has to be greatly increased. A systematic framework to ensure the safety of journalists is essential for Maldives.