Ex-pres Maumoon questioned over missing ruling party hard drive

Police on Thursday questioned the former president and leader of ruling Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM), Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, regarding a missing hard drive from PPM’s former office in capital Male.

According to PPM, Police questioned Former President Maumoon at his office Thursday afternoon.

In a tweet, Maumoon stated that the police had accorded him great respect in the inquiry, during which the former president had stated that he has no information regarding the whereabouts of the missing hard disk. Maumoon added that he had told the police to question the people responsible for breaking into PPM’s Office and removing all its assets and documents instead.

Following the political fallout between PPM’s leader Maumoon and his half-brother and incumbent President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom, which had divided the ruling party into two factions, the Civil Court had ordered Maumoon to hand over PPM’s control to President Yameen. In the wake of the court order, President Yameen’s faction of PPM had removed all assets, documents and equipment of the party from its former office, which is used by Former President Maumoon’s faction.

However, President Yameen’s faction had later filed a case over a hard drive, containing important party documents and information, which was missing from the assets they took.

Since the investigation began, Police has raided PPM’s Office as well as the apartment of Abdul Aleem, the Secretary General appointed by Maumoon’s faction, under a court order to find the hard drive. Aleem and Aminath Nadhira, the deputy leader appointed by Maumoon’s Factions were also summoned to Police headquarters for questioning.

Prior to leader Maumoon, the latest individual to be questioned was his daughter Yumna Maumoon, who was summoned to Police headquarters on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, deputy leader Nadhira declared that President Yameen’s faction currently uses the information database that was on the “missing” hard drive for their activities.

“They’re contacting people to invite them to tomorrow [Friday] night’s event at Hulhumale [to commence President Yameen’s campaign for the Presidential Elections 2018] using contact numbers that were in that hard drive. How would they contact them if they didn’t already have the database?” she questioned.