plan the plan

Funny how themaldivian.org took and modified the first paragraph of my previous post and posted it on their website, just the portion praising the current admin. What a bunch of sly weasels. This is suppose to be an impartial website. Frankly all the websites are propaganda websites and trying to propagate some hidden agenda. There are no real venues for impartial news.. Maybe the gossips at the tea cafes are more authentic than the ones that these guys write on their websites.

Talks about Anni being freed is in the air. Personally I doubt this unless mdp makes a huge commotion proving that with or without Anni they have the vigor and determination to move forward. As of now it looks like gasim (current financial minister) who switched sides and Anni who is in jail are the spine of this party proving that they are not a party of the people. I think Ibra (male' Mp) should re kindle the party spirit more within male' and addu and prove to everyone that this is really a peoples party. There was one gathering of mdp held and the number of people there were amazing, they should organize more of these grass root gatherings... of course there was a little confrontation between the police and the mdp gathering regarding some speaker system. I can’t talk too much about this, as I was not present there.
Whatever the outcome of Anni's trail he has become a hero in my heart. I don’t know him nor never met him in real life but he has become the modern Robinhood of this country. Yes! I do agree that many of mdp members have personal hidden agendas. They hide in the backstage and try to run the show. My support for Anni is no reflection of my support for mdp. Anni, since the days of Sangu (a banned paper during the late 80’s) have been a fighter, sacrificed his whole life for the common good of the people. Like it or not he is going down in history as a hero.

The other day I was reading this article about the current GDP of the Maldives shrinking. The funny thing about GDP is that it is one of the stupidest yardstick to calculate the growth of a country. For those of you who would like to get a better sense of what GDP is please read:
Wikipedia entry
foe
Adbusters

In Maldives very few people really understand what GDP is (including me) I have no real idea of how it is calculated in Maldives but it looks like a tool that this government use in order to shift around its policies. I do not understand why the GDP should go down due to tsunami when it should go up if the promised rebuilding where taking place. Here is a quote from Wikipedia:
"GDP counts work that produces no net change. For instance, a hurricane destroying thousands of homes would not be counted by GDP, but the rebuilding of those homes would be."
In fact the GDP of this country should be rising. Yes the tourism industry was and is still in pretty bad shape, which is true, but also to counter this millions of dollars was donated to this country. I wonder if these donations were calculated as an income to this country and if it was used in calculating the current dip in GDP. Maybe the government should make a better effort in educating the public about what is going on with our economy and what money goes where, rather than expecting us to blindly trust an administration that spits a lie every time it opens it mouth.
Here is my interpretation, from our foreign minister (Ahmed Shaheed) interview to routers, where the current administrations solution for the current dip in gdp is to:

"Shaheed said the government was mulling the idea of setting up an oil refinery somewhere in the pristine island cluster best known for its five-star resorts, white sand beaches, turquoise lagoons and world-class scuba diving.
The government is looking to donors to help plug a $100 million budget shortfall, the first time the remote archipelago 500 miles (800 km) off the toe of India has ever done so.
It is also considering auctioning leases to build luxury hotels to bring in revenue, and is hoping to use some of around $360 million worth of aid pledged in the wake of the tsunami to ease pressure on the budget."

I have no idea how setting up oil refineries will help this small nation when the problem with oil is not necessarily refineries but the damn oil is running out. halash.. Empty.. Gone.. Finished.. Wake-up people.... oil will run out... so in the next 100 years we will be stuck with some stupid refineries that this current administration built with bottles of coconut oil to refine. This will end up like so many other ill thought policies of this country.. Remember the hovercraft they bought with taxpayer’s money and built a landing zone for it.. Remember the Laamu atoll Dhanaal build as a boarding school...remember the national airlines.. Remember the garment factories... remember the amount of cement they poured to build the male roads in their first try... remember the concrete water tanks that was build in every house hold in male... oh yes I am talking about all the ill policies and not mentioning the good actions.. Why???? Because until the current administration apologize and publishes the fact about the cost of these projects there is no way the people will stop commenting about these messed projects where OUR money just disappeared. Anyways back to the oil refineries.. Well, would it not make more sense for us to try and find ways for sustainable alternative more sustainable energy plans like wind, wave or solar power. These refineries will pollute our beaches and destroy our echo system ultimately destroying our only income- tourism. Does this administration even care about what might happen in the long run..?

Their second solution "auction islands". Now this smells fishy, this will be money grabbing political opportunity to please a lot of powerful corporations. This will in turn help to wade off any foreign pressure on the government. Like the Middle East and oil cartels Maldives uses islands to please the powerful hotel conglomerates that are large financiers of political parties in foreign countries. Here is a list of American hotel chains and how much they contribute to their parties:
opensecrets
Anyways this will also bring down the demand, as there will be surplus resorts.

I flipping don’t understand where the millions of dollars that come in to this country goes. On top of all the money it receives from resorts there are the donors as well. Its not like there is universal health care, pension plan, social housing projects, The only thing they spend the money is for education of less than 100, 000 people up to secondary education and about 500 students in higher education. and about a 500 students at university level. Where the F**** are the money that our forefathers sweat for????