ACC seeks charge against Umar Naseer over corruption in procurement of electronic tags

Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has requested the Prosecutor General’s Office for charges against former Home Minister Umar Naseer, stating an investigation uncovered corruption in the award of a government contract to procure electronic tags to monitor criminals. 

The contract to procure electronic tags was awarded to Stalwart Maldives in 2015 – when Umar had been serving as Home Minister. 

ACC requested the Prosecutor General’s Office for Umar to be charged with misuse of official authority under Section 513 (b) of the Penal Code on Tuesday. 

ACC said its investigation found Stalwart had close ties with Umar, and that all four shareholders of the company were close business associates. 

ACC said it also found the procurement process was held in violation of standard protocol, under Umar’s direct supervision. 

“Therefore, Stalwart was owned by people who Umar Naseer had conflict of interest with. However, Umar Naseer himself set up a technical committee to evaluate the trial of the Stalwart’s tags and acted as chairman of the committee,” said ACC. 

Though the technical committee approved the electronic tags proposed by Stalwart, the committee did not decide to award the contract to the company. And the contract wasn’t submitted to the Home Ministry’s bid committee for evaluation either. 

ACC said a letter signed by Umar was sent to the Finance Ministry seeking advice to make an advance payment of MVR 500,000 to Stalwart. The commission said it found the advance payment was made in order to make it easier for the company to establish its business, and because the company needed to take out a loan. 

Umar has denied any wrongdoing in the award of the contract. 

He told Sun that the contract was awarded after an open tender, to the company which had quoted the lowest rate. 

He said that he had received clearance from both the Finance Ministry and ACC for the project.