Some Members of Parliament (MPs) representing the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) has said that their Parliamentary Group did not decide to boycott the parliament sitting held yesterday, and that the required quorum was not achieved because many of the members were out of Malé.
One of the MPs said that the parliamentary group had not sent any instructions about attending yesterday's sitting. However, since Monday was declared as a government holiday, many members were out of Malé.
October 1 and 2 were declared as government holidays due to the elections held on Saturday, September 30. Despite it being a government holiday, the Secretariat of the People's Majlis decided to schedule a sitting.
Fifteen members were present at the start time of today's sitting while the quorum required for a sitting of the Majlis is 22 members.
Speaker of Parliament Mohamed Nasheed, who was chairing the sitting, expressed his confusion over the absence of members and their lack of attendance at the parliament session.
Speaker Nasheed has repeatedly expressed his concerns about not being able to conduct parliament sittings due to lack of quorum.
The agenda for Monday's sitting included the matter of the letter sent by the Elections Commission to the parliament regarding the resolution to conduct a referendum to determine whether the system of government in the Maldives needs to be changed.
An amendment to the Constitution has been submitted to the parliament, proposed by North Maafannu MP Imthiyaz Fahmy. The amendment states that if a referendum has already been conducted to obtain public opinion on a matter as required by the Constitution, a further referendum about a bill passed by the parliament regarding the same matter is not necessary before the president ratifies the bill.
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