Senior officials of the Department of National Registration (DNR) admitted today that several political appointees of the Home Ministry filled ruling party People's National Congress (PNC)'s membership forms inside the DNR office.
This comes following serious allegations against the party for having registered members to the party without their knowledge. Photos of PNC members filling the forms inside the DNR office, which stores citizens' personal information, also got leaked on social media, further intensifying criticism against PNC.
The photos in question show Homeland Security Minister Ali Ihusan and several state and deputy ministers there as well.
Both Elections Commission and Maldives Police Service have since launched investigations into the submission of fraudulent forms and misuse of people's private information.
A new development in the case erupted today after DNR invited local media to observe the agency's operations. Prior to the meeting, officials also allowed media access into the room where the alleged PNC forms were filled.
After that, Home Ministry's State Minister Abdul Majeed Ibrahim and Deputy Minister Ahmed Ali held a press conference at the doorstep of the office.
Responding to a question from Mihaaru, Majeed confirmed that the room in the images is in fact the DNR meeting room. He also said that the meeting room is a separate space within the DNR office and that other departments are also allowed to use the space when requested.
“The work you are referring to was carried out inside there [the meeting room] by us. Like I said the work was done in a separate meeting room," he said.
When questioned further by reporters, he said forms had been filled for the PNC on behalf of a “home team” comprising political personnel belonging to institutions under the ministry “led by Minister Ali Ihusan”.
He also said that the DNR database is very large and if the allegations made are true, more forms would have been submitted.
"The minister conducted it in a very organized and planned manner in which everyone was involved. All the political personnel in the Ministry of Homeland were asked to conduct the recruitment process to increase party membership as much as possible," he said.
He said that there are 56 political personnel under the ministry and each of them had been asked to "bring in as many forms as possible".
Majeed did not respond to further questions by Mihaaru clarifying whether he was admitting to have filled out party forms to seek support for a political party inside a state agency.
Other journalists repeated the question and both Majeed and Ali left the press conference without further comments.
A person in charge of the Home Ministry's media department came in later and informed members of the press that the briefing was over.