It took a moment to notice the blood pouring down his shirt. As his
attackers sauntered off, Hilath staggered to the main road, clutching
the loose skin over his throat with one hand. He managed to hitch a lift
to hospital from a horrified motorcyclist. When a doctor in the
emergency room asked him to move his hand away, a policeman and nurse
fainted.
Following a miraculous recovery – doctors told him there
was less than a 1 per cent chance of surviving such an attack – Hilath,
35, now lives in exile in Sri Lanka. He misses home, but a country where
it is illegal to be non-Muslim and violent forms of religious
fundamentalism are on the rise is no place for a homosexual secularist,
he says.
"Extremism is the biggest threat my country faces," he
said at a coffee shop in Colombo. "I was the first person to talk openly
about homosexuality and religious freedom. People said I was brave, but
often I think I was stupid."
Recent weeks have put a spotlight on
Islamic fundamentalism in the Maldives after a 15-year-old girl who had
been repeatedly raped by her stepfather was sentenced to 100 lashes for
"fornication". A petition by the global advocacy group Avaaz has been
signed by more than two million people demanding a tourist boycott until
the flogging sentence is annulled.
In a rare interview at his
home this week, President Mohammed Waheed told The Independent that he
strongly opposes the court ruling. "This case should not have come to
the courts at all. We see this girl as a victim," he said, adding that
he has set up a committee to "understand what went wrong".
But
that sits awkwardly with his recent decision to enter into a coalition
with the religious Adhaalath party with elections to be held in
September.
In a recent statement, Adhaalath backed the flogging,
saying: "The purpose of penalties like these in Islamic shariah is to
maintain order in society and to save it from sinful acts. We must turn a
deaf ear to the international organisations which are calling to
abolish these penalties."
Few of the million visitors to the
Maldives each year see this side of the country. Most are whisked off to
uninhabited resort islands before even setting foot on the crowded,
alcohol-free capital of Malé. But the flogging case was not an isolated
incident – Islamic hardliners, many trained in Pakistan and Saudi
Arabia, have become a shadowy but powerful presence here. They are
blamed for a raid on the national museum last year in which a priceless
collection of ancient Buddhist artefacts was destroyed. They are also
thought to be behind the killing in October of a member of parliament
who had spoken out against extremism. The police have made little
progress in either case.
Religious conservatives were also the
driving force behind weeks-long protests that toppled the country's
first Democratic President, Mohamed Nasheed, in February last year.
Mr
Nasheed's election in 2008 had ended 30 years of dictatorship, but his
liberal, Western style was used by opponents to paint him as un-Islamic –
even a secret Christian. Although Mr Nasheed resigned on live
television, he later claimed it was done "with a gun to my head" and
that he was the victim of a coup.
The new President says the
changeover was perfectly legal. But eyebrows were raised when he gave
ministerial posts to the son and daughter of the former dictator Maumoon
Gayoom, and chose three religious leaders from the Adhaalath party for
his cabinet, even though the party holds no seats in parliament.
Dr
Waheed defended his choice this week, saying: "They want to ensure
Islamic values are protected. We are all working with that in mind."
Out
on one of the Maldives' 200 inhabited islands, Mr Nasheed and members
of his Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) were back on the campaign trail
last week, hoping they can regain through the ballot box what was lost
to the mob.
On most islands he receives a hero's welcome, still
the man who endured torture and years behind bars to bring democracy to
the country. But this day's campaigning brought him to the island of
Huraa: as stunning as the rest, with its turquoise waters, palm trees
and white sands, but a stronghold of conservative forces.
Women
greeted Mr Nasheed with a table of whisky bottles to imply his alleged
love of alcohol. As he tried to address a small crowd in the town hall,
they stood outside shrieking maniacally in an attempt to drown him out.
Attempts to approach them for their views almost triggered a riot.
"They
are screaming because they are losing and they know it," Mr Nasheed
said at his hotel later that evening. "The coup has actually been a
blessing in disguise. It exposed the mullahs. When they took jobs in
government, it became obvious that they were just using religion for
political ends. Hardly anyone is joining their rallies now."
It is
not yet clear whether Mr Nasheed will be allowed to stand in
September's elections. The current government and judiciary are doing
their best to throw him in prison for his attempt to arrest a senior
judge during the final days of his presidency. So far, his trial has
been delayed by technicalities, but there are fears that more extreme
measures are about to be deployed.
"There is no question that they wanted me dead during the coup," Mr Nasheed said. "They have unfinished business with me."
Such
fears have put his supporters on edge. The islands have been gripped in
recent weeks by news that a pair of alleged Armenian gangsters known as
the Artur brothers have been photographed in the company of government
ministers. Rumours quickly spread on social media that they were
assassins sent to kill Mr Nasheed.
The brothers – who use the
names Artur Sargsyan and Artur Margaryan – made international headlines
in 2006 after being kicked out of Kenya amid allegations they had built a
drug-trafficking empire with links to the highest government offices.
They were deported only after pulling guns on customs officials in a
Nairobi airport.
The Maldives government says they were in town to
set up an investment company, and has hastily cancelled their permits
in the wake of the media attention, but the episode showed how tense the
political situation has become. "Everyone is worried about [Mr
Nasheed's] safety," said Eva Abdulla, an MDP politician. "Things look
calm, but if he is jailed or killed, there will be huge amounts of
violence on the streets."
Despite their grievances, the MDP had
its fair share of controversies during its time in power. The party was
accused of bribing opposition MPs, sidelining critics and failing to
clean up a deeply corrupt judiciary when it had the chance. Mr Nasheed's
decision to arrest the judge was condemned internationally and only
fuelled the protests that led to his downfall.
"It's true that we
made mistakes," Ms Abdulla said. "We underestimated how much power the
old regime still had and they managed to build a lot of anger against
Nasheed. But the coup has jolted people out of their apathy. People have
realised that their new democratic rights are quite precarious."
Mr Nasheed hopes that his focus on development will ultimately drown out the religious rhetoric.
He
is particularly fond of his decision to allow locals to open guest
houses on inhabited islands, which were banned. That is starting to
break the monopoly enjoyed by millionaire resort owners, and bring
tourist dollars into the rural economy for the first time.
He is
also touting a financial-support scheme for single mothers – a
particular hit because the Maldives happens to have the highest divorce
rate in the world. "All the opposition can do is wave alcohol bottles at
us," one of Mr Nasheed's campaign organisers said, walking away from
the screaming women on Huraa. "We have actual policies, and eventually
that will get through to people."
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