A close associate of the main-ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) 's President and Parliament Speaker, Mohamed Nasheed, has filed a case in the Civil Court seeking an order to hold the MDP presidential primary again.
The case was filed in the Civil Court on Wednesday by Police Board Member and former Henveiru South MP Hamid Abdul Ghafoor. Hamid's lawyer in the case is Dhiyana Saeed, the Attorney General during the Nasheed administration.
President Solih contested against Nasheed in the party's primary in January and won the election by a large margin. President Solih received 61 percent of votes -- 24,572 votes- against Nasheed's 39 percent -- 15,631 votes. Nasheed's campaign team believes he faced defeat in the primary because 39,000 members on the MDP register were expelled from the party ahead of the primary. The five-member committee overseeing the primary has ruled that more than 60 complaints filed by Nasheed's team are not enough to change the outcome of the primary.
The petition filed by Ghafoor mainly seeks an interim order to stop the handing over of the MDP's presidential ticket to President Solih and an order to re-hold the primary. The case has been filed while MDP prepares to officially hand over the presidential ticket to Presidnt Solih on Friday night.
