Jailed former president Mohamed Nasheed on Monday called on all state institutions to back the opposition coalition's efforts for reform insisting that the opposition now had the "legal authority" after securing the majority support of the people and the parliament.
Nasheed was jailed on terror charges after he was convicted and sentenced to 13 years in prison over the arbitrary detention of a sitting judge while he was president.
He now lives in self imposed exile in the UK after he was allowed to leave to Britain on medical leave in an internationally brokered deal in January last year.
After months of political strife which led to the jailing of several top politicians over contentious charges, the main opposition leaders including former presidents Maumoon Abdul Gayoom and Nasheed penned a historic treaty to work against the government.
The opposition has since diverted its focus to weaken the government through the parliament. The efforts received a major boost on Monday, after the opposition wrested parliament control from the government, securing the signatures of 45 lawmakers to file a fresh censure motion to unseat the parliament speaker.
After the now opposition coalition in March had filed a second motion to unseat speaker Abdulla Maseeh, the government had engineered an amendment to the parliament rules of procedure raising the number of lawmaker signatures required to file a censure motion against the speaker and his deputy from 15 to 42.
The opposition had filed the third censure motion against Maseeh with 45 lawmakers which included nine lawmakers from the ruling party.
During a rally held at the main Jumhoory Party (JP) camp to celebrate the latest victory, Nasheed in a message said the opposition efforts have now gained legal authority after its landslide win the recent local council elections and the opposition majority in parliament.
"I want to urge independent institutions, the courts and security forces not to impede our efforts to reform this country as we now have the backing of both the people and the parliament, giving our efforts legal authority," Nasheed stressed.
