One step forward and three steps backward

The amendment to decentralization bill to have as many councils as you want has been ratified. According to this amendment each administrative unit (mistakenly) called an island is also to have their separate councils.I checked the meaning of island from the dictionary and it says

“A land mass (smaller than a continent) that is surrounded by water”

Hence I do not understand how anyone can call a part or ward of an island such as kulhduhoo, fares, maathoda, hulhudhoo meedhoo, feydhoo, maradhoo, etc separately an island. Two schools, two island offices, two health centers in an island where it only takes maximum 15 minutes to cover by walk- with a combined population barely reaching a thousand or two is really ridiculous. With that comes ‘artificial ‘job creation in the civil and other services where public money is wasted for zero productivity (5 or 6 billion out of 7 billion revenue as salaries) and the result is fat and expensive administration.

We gave up the choice to have a lean administration with minimal costs and save the money to use for productive work that would contribute to better quality of life.

Its a win for the politicians a great loss for the people!

Comments

Anonymous said…

Having 2 Island offices, 2 schools, 2 courts...and so on is not a problem, but having 2 counsel is what a huge problem.
More than 100 islands are living less than 1000 people.., major enomic and developmental problem. So why governmnet cant rais up with new consolidated policy rather than encouraging that small population living isolate do they have any?

13 September 2010 at 13:49

Anonymous said…

maybe kandukos can fix your problem?

Maumoon vs. Kandukos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpE8pnHEGfE

14 September 2010 at 09:06

A Nation Sold Out!

We often talk about how corrupt are the politicians and those who are in high offices. I would say all of us are bonded through the chain corruption. First we sell our vote to the highest bidder, digging our own grave. The members than sell his/her vote to the Ultimate Buyer for money, position, power and so on The Ultimate Buyer, instead of meeting our demands, controls the members through the chain of corruption; we become helpless and our hopes for a decent life and a prosperous future gone. We cry, and whine saying how corrupt is the Majlis, the government and each and everyone who are in positions of power. After 21 days* we forget about everything and go about our lives and in between if some need arise, we beg the member or the Ultimate Buyer the member or the Ultimate buyer fulfills the need, on the promise of selling our vote again. It’s a vicious circle My request to Mps - to include vote buying/selling undue inducement as a criminal offence ...

1000 islands, 1000 opportunities

Often we are bombarded with messages stating, we do not have any natural resources and therefore we are poor. Just because we do not have oil does not mean we lack natural resources to move our economy forward. When you think of it, the 1000 more islands are the natural resources we have. We are using less than 150 islands for industrial purposes. The rest is untouched and unused. Tourism has shown that each island can be turned into multi million dollar cash generating investments. However, the problem is policy makers seems unable to think beyond tourism. Policies in assigning islands for industrial purposes need to be reviewed and prevent over concentration on tourism in a single atoll. Within the atolls (including Kaafu and other atolls that has high concentration of tourism), islands can be leased to fisheries, agriculture, education, health, and many more other industries and make them easily accessible for people to go for jobs or to acquire goods and services. Build...

Can we, women of this country, have some space to grow food and offer food security to our family?

Illustration by Aishath Rishtha Translation: “When the Last Tree Is Cut Down, the Last Fish Eaten, and the Last Stream Poisoned, You Will Realize That You Cannot Eat Money” 2014: Think about it? In 2014, I started writing a book using census and all available economic data on every atoll including data on how many uninhabited islands each atoll has. I thought that showing demographic, geographic and economic data will make people realize we need to do something about abandoning such rich resources for a congested living in Male’…. I shared the first draft with friends and mother thinking everyone will be very pleased. They weren’t happy. Major problem seemed to be - “just throwing data on people is not enough… we need to talk about some solutions. Take food security for one…..” 2016: Write about it? The book (Falhu Aliran Muy)- now twice bulky, with economic history (on the suggestion of Late Ali Hussain of Novelty Printers) and 11 interventions on future of ato...

Voice of Maldives Islands

Search This Blog