With only five days remaining before the legal duration of the Ombudsperson's Office of Transitional Justice expires, Ombudsperson Jihadha Anees has resigned after posing multiple allegations.
In a statement she released after tendering her resignation, the Ombudsperson highlighted facing several challenges since the first day she assumed responsibility of her position.
She further said that necessary investigations did not commence despite the elapse of one year out of the legal duration of two years for the office. Jihadha alleged there were systemic obstructions to the conducting of investigations.
According to Jihadha, all 469 cases submitted would have been investigated if the office had functioned properly.
"Despite the time constraints, several cases were investigated by 2022 end, but cannot be completed since the most superior person responsible for addressing them had not attended to the cases, and by October 2023 resolution of majority of these cases did not commence," Jihadha said in her statement.
"And an ombudsperson later appointed to the office did not attend for several days."
Jihadha, who is a former Assistant Prosecutor General said that despite requests to make decisions on the cases, the superiors prioritized their personal agendas. She further said that due to significant absences of superior officials to important meetings, several of the tasks remained incomplete.
She alleged abrupt recommencement of investigations against regulations on purposefully delayed cases previously with just two weeks left of the legal duration of the office. Jihadha also alleged that the findings of previously completed cases were altered as well.
"... there are attempts to show presence of ombudsperson in official meetings for which they did not attend, while cases have been altered by excluding the ombudspersons originally attached to them, while information about these cases have not been reported to me while they have been making decisions on cases in contravention with the Transitional Justice Act," Jihadha alleged.
She also highlighted facing several challenges and attempts to intimidate her and recounted an incident of an employee of the office attempting to sexually harass her in her office while under the influence of intoxication.
Despite repeated acts of harassment from the said employee, they were not taken disciplinary action against, nor terminated due to the close association with the Chief Ombudsperson.
"After the employee was released from the custody of Maldives Police Service, they clearly stated on the employees' WhatsApp group that no action would be taken against them despite the continued sexual harassment. The employee continued to harass me and other female employees of the office."
She also alleged of toxic work environment and a culture of bullying which was mentally affecting the employees, and added that the issues were ignored without action.
With the term of the office concluding next Friday, November 17, she raised concerns that the employment contract of the permanent staff have not been decided yet.
In her justification, Jihadha said she chose to resign since there are no legal remedies against the misconduct while she believes in the possibility of further misconduct in the upcoming days.
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