Majlis to hold opening session on 19 March

The Speaker of the Majlis, Abdullah Shahid has announced that the Majlis will hold the opening session on Monday, 19 March 2012.

According to the secretariat of the Majlis, the session will begin at 10:00hrs on Monday. Despite there being no fruitful outcome in the ongoing dialogue to reach a mutually agreeable date to reconvene the opening session of the Majlis the Speaker stated that he remain committed with his efforts to do so before Monday.

The opening session was postponed with the MPs of the MDP obstructed the President, Dr. Mohamed Waheed from giving his Presidential Address.

On March 1st MPs of MDP entered the Majlis Chambers ahead of the scheduled session and occupied the Speaker’s Chair and podium. They then tore down the national flag behind the Speaker’s Chair, took the Speaker’s Chair out of the Chambers, sang and danced on the Speaker’s podium, and obstructed the Speaker from entering the Chambers.

Inside Majlis, MDP MP’s demand was an early election date for their Supremo ex-President Mohamed Nasheed. MDP would not allow Parliament to convene before an election date was announced, the party said.

Together with his Ministers, President Dr. Mohamed Waheed had to wait 10 hours in the Majlis premises to discharge his constitutional responsibility to deliver a State of the Nation Address to the opening session, departing only when the session was finally cancelled by the Speaker.

After 10 hours of obstruction during which Nasheed’s MPs refused several attempts by the Speaker of the Majlis Abdulla Shahid to speak with them to discuss a reasonable way to enable Parliament to function, Speaker Shahid postponed the Parliamentary opening session indefinitely.

In a press conference following the events, Shahid explained that he had taken this decision in order not to use force to hold Parliament. He condemned the hijacking of the Parliament, saying that “most important institution of the country has been crippled”.