AG Niyazi has advised the government to recover the payments made and called for accountability for those involved in finalizing the agreement without due diligence.
Auditor General Hussain Niyazi has said that action must be taken against those responsible for the previous administration's decision to pay MVR 64 million in compensation to Dheebaja Investment Company.
Niyazi added that the out-of-court agreement was detrimental to the state.
The decision, made under the previous administration, resulted in an MVR 12 million payment to Dheebaja last September, despite insufficient verification of expenses related to the compensation amount.
The compensation dispute originated from a 2011 ferry service contract with Dheebaja, canceled in 2013 by the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) government. In 2019, Supreme Court ruled for an initial MVR 348 million compensation, which the government later revised to an out of court settlement of MVR 174 million before seeking a review.
The Supreme Court, in 2022, ruled that the agreement’s cancellation was illegal and sent it back to the lower court to determine the compensation.
However, the government moved to settle for MVR 64 million out of court while the case was still in the Civil Court.
The Auditor General’s report criticized the agreement, noting that the government failed to verify MVR 11 million of the claimed expenses. Additionally, Dheebaja reportedly profited from the sale of Raa atoll Kudakurathu for MVR 65 million, which they had acquired under a 2011 sublease from the government.
The report states that with the sale of the sublease, the government is not liable to pay any further compensation to Dheebaja.
Auditor General Niyazi has advised the government to recover the payments made and called for accountability for those involved in finalizing the agreement without due diligence.
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