Tourism Employees Association of Maldives (TEAM) has urged from Elections Commission (EC) to reveal the names of resorts denying to place ballot boxes for upcoming presidential election.
President of Maldives electoral watchdog Ahmed Shareef on Sunday revealed that the island nation consists of more than 77 resorts with local employee count exceeding 100, from the registered 130 resorts. However, Shareef noted only 36 resorts agreed to place ballot boxes for presidential polls.
According to TEAM the resorts denying voting rights for locals should be exposed, adding they are concerned about influential resort owners and expatriate managerial members stripping the rights away from local staffs employed in these resorts.
Explaining about its decision of allowing only seven resort islands, the commission's president on Sunday spoke to local media. According to Shareef, the commission had discussed placing ballot boxes in 130 resort outlets operating in Maldives with a local personnel count above 250.
Shareef detailed that from the 130 resorts the commission deliberated with, only 12 resorts had shown interest while 27 resorts said they were uninterested. The remaining 79 resorts did not respond accordingly as per EC president.
Furthermore Shareef noted that of the 12 resorts that had shown interest, the final seven resorts were selected through the commission's mandated prerequisites.
However, the commission had since moved to change its decision of including resorts with a local personnel count of 250 and above to 100 and above in order to provide voting option for more locals employed in resorts.
In previous presidential poll ballot boxes were placed in resorts with a local employee count exceeding 100. Ballot boxes were placed in a total of 42 resort outlets in the last election.
