Avoid the Confusion - Avoid the Void

It is time that the local media stop simply carrying all the confusion generated so religiously by some politicians to show why the elections cannot be held inside the timeline provided by the constitution

Every time such a story comes out, it is important that it be presented in the proper context, along with reasons to the contrary as well. Otherwise, it cultivates a kind of unsettling confusion in the minds of the innocent public, who expect things to go as decreed in the constitution.

An Appeal to the Media

We must all realize that none of us has the authority or the capacity to breach the constitution. We must all realize that none of us has the authority or the capacity to correct any wrong committed against the constitution. We must all realize that there is none of us who could show the next path or the next plan if we fail to achieve a timeline or task as provided in the constitution.

We must all grow up and assume responsibility to ensure that we all work to meet the deadline of 10 October for presidential elections.

This is not the time to feed our doubts and uncertainties to the public. It is time to deliver as expected of us, even if it means personal sacrifices, sleepless nights, and long hours.

Some Questions for the Discerning

If for any reason, the presidential elections slip beyond the constitutional deadline of 10 October, several questions would crop up.

Will the constitution recognize any presidential elections held later than the time decreed in the constitution? Who will decide those elections to be legitimate and within the constitution? Can it be within the legitimate powers of the parliament, a creature of the constitution, to decide a different set of dates for the presidential elections or to acquiesce to a postponement outside the constitutional timeframe?

Can the Elections Commission, a creature of the constitution, create a different set of dates? How valid will those dates be? Who will confirm the validity of any such dates? Will that set of dates be considered as lawful?

Can the Supreme Court give a new set of paths to walk, if we fail to achieve the 10 October deadline and fail to hold elections within the timeline? How legitimate would such an alternative path be? Can the Supreme Court, also a creature and ultimate guardian of the constitution go against the very constitution it shall uphold and apply? Can the Supreme Court do anything lawfully except apply, interpret, and decide according to the constitution? Can the Supreme Court have the right to put riders on the constitution, or provide alternative paths to follow? Who will confirm their validity?

Can anyone, all being created under the constitution, effectively and lawfully provide and alternative path or date to which is provided in the constitution? How valid would that be under the constitution?

The fact of the matter is that there is none in this country who could rectify a breach of the constitution.

All of our institutions, the president, the parliament, the Supreme Court, and the independent institutions are all mere creatures of the constitution, and derive powers from the constitution, and exercise their powers to the extent provided in the constitution. Proposing a mechanism outside the constitution or one that alters the constitution is simply outside the bounds of any institution under the Maldivian skies.

All of those institutions work under and inside the constitution. None of them can create a path alternative to the constitution, or rewrite a requirement provided in the constitution. None of them could lawfully provide a path not mentioned in or not recognized by the constitution.

Therefore, however pressed we are for time, which again is by and large due to our own doing, the only way forward is for all of us to work together and aim at holding the presidential elections in time.

There is no other lawful way. There is no other legitimate option. There is no other way in which we could serve the constitution.

Issues to Reflect upon

We must begin to spend time finding ways to meet the constitutional deadline, rather than wasting our precious time filling the minds of the public with serious confusion and political rhetoric.

We all should realize it. The media must realize it. It must stop giving space and airtime to those creative politicians who want to find space in the spectrum - who want to quietly prep the people for a Maldives placed in a constitutional vacuum.

If the country goes into crisis mode, they would not be there to take responsibility for any mishap, or failure. They would not be there to provide any hard answers to the tough legal questions that would be raised. They would not be there to lend any validity to any alternative path, when the country plunges into a constitutional void.

When this country goes into a constitutional vacuum, all minds would stop operating, and everyone would pass the buck to the other, but will not be able to put things right back within the constitution. None could say what would be the starting point, and none could say where the end would be.

Two Points to Remember

Please remember this simple point.

The president, cabinet, parliament, the judiciary, independent commissions and persons in independent offices, all state institutions, all persons in any State post, and simply all citizens are specifically asked by the constitution to comply with the provisions of the constitution from the moment it comes into force.

See article 299 of the constitution, if you have any doubt.

Please also remember this additional point.

Any deadline created outside the deadline of 10 October provided in the constitution would amount in effect to an amendment brought to the constitution.

The constitution is clear that there cannot be an amendment of the constitution until presidential and parliamentary elections have been held and the first president and the first set of parliamentarians have assumed their office.

See article 292 if one doubts my explanation. How clear does the constitutional lock against any amendment have to be?

When these two articles are read together, I do not know how someone subject to the constitution could even think of a day that we would have breached the constitution, or failed to achieve a deadline or task provided in the constitution.

Taking strength from those two provisions, I am also of the opinion, if we default in the presidential elections, nothing legitimate could follow thereafter from the constitution.

Why do we as Maldivians, want to take such a risk? Can we afford to take such a risk?

Repeating the Plea for Media

That is why it is time that the country's journalists and the media, who communicate with the public on these issues, need to understand the issue of a constitutional vacuum in its entirety, gravity, and enormity.

It is time that the media shall stop simple promotion of rhetoric generated by politicians, and push them to do their job and hold them to their task.

Instead of just informing the public on what the politicians are saying, media must now start to interpret those remarks in proper context, so that the public would know why certain politicians are claiming that elections cannot be held in the country by 10 October, and what the ramifications would be for the country, if we fall complacent and do not do our part to honor the constitution.

It is said in an advertisement to ban sale of fur and fur clothes, that, when the buying (of fur clothes) stops, the killing (of animals) would stop as well.

I want to borrow the idea of dependence here and say this: when media stops the promotion, the politicians would have to stop their sensation creating rhetoric and get back to work. That is where they all belong.

Source: www.mnasheed.com