Former President Mohamed Nasheed spoke at USIP on June 25 at an event co-hosted with the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict on his country’s political challenges, nonviolence and climate change. Learn more about this discussion
June 26, 2012
"We must have elections and the people of the Maldives must decide," said Mohamed Nasheed, former president of the Republic of the Maldives, at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) on June 25.
Prior to Nasheed's election in 2008, the primarily Muslim country consisting of nearly 2,000 islands in the Indian Ocean had never held multiparty presidential elections. The previous leader, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, maintained a corrupt authoritarian rule for 30 years, Nasheed said at the event. The former president argued that Maldivians were once again stripped of their political freedoms when he was forced to resign from the presidency in February 2012.
On Nonviolence
Despite his forced resignation and political intimidation, Nasheed emphasized that building political parties is far more efficient in achieving peace than toppling a government. Instead, he wants to revive the country's democracy with new elections. "We do not want to topple a government. We want an election," he told the audience at USIP.
Indeed, Nasheed this month secured his Maldivian Democratic Party's nomination to be its presidential candidate in the next elections. However, the current president, Mohamed Waheed, has said that the earliest elections could be held under their constitution was in July 2013.
On the Arab Uprisings
"I feel that what has happened in the Maldives," continued Nasheed, "would help us in trying to understand what might happen in Tunisia, in Egypt, in Libya, in Syria and so on."
On Climate Change
In his introductory remarks, USIP President Richard H. Solomon stated that in addition to delivering democracy to the Maldives, Nasheed is known for "his steadfast leadership on the environmental protection of his country." Peter Ackerman, founding chair of the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, which co-hosted the event, moderated the discussion with Nasheed. Prior to this discussion, USIP screened a segment of "The Island President," a newly released documentary that chronicles Nasheed's environmental activism during his first year in office. At 1.5 meters above sea level, the Maldives are under severe threat of being entirely submerged due to climate change.