Nashath and Asif dismissed; Zahir survives vote

Combined photos of (from L-R) Dr. Mohamed Zahir, Ali Nashath, and Mohamed Asif.

The Parliament passed no-confidence motions against Elections Commission (EC) vice president Ali Nashath and member Mohamed Asif in face of serious allegations of misconduct including creating and selling fake membership applications to political parties on Monday, while Dr. Mohamed Zahir – who faced the same allegations - surprisingly survived the vote.

The Parliament heard motions to dismiss six commissioners from the EC, Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) and the Civil Service Commission (CSC) on November 12. They are:

EC vice president Nashath
EC member Asif
EC member Zahir
CSC president Mohamed Nasih
ACC vice president Abdul Salam
ACC member Thoha Mohamed

The Independent Institutions Committee, which reviewed the motions, voted to dismiss all of the commissioners except for Nasih.

Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC)’s vice president Abdul Salam (L) and member Thoha Mohamed (R).

However, the two members of the ACC, Abdul Salam and Thoha had both resigned ahead of the floor vote on Monday afternoon.

Therefore, the Parliament had taken votes on the motions against Nashath, Asif, Zahir and Nasih.

The motion against Nashath passed with a majority vote of 69-10, while the motion against Asif passed with a majority vote of 68-10.

But in a surprising turn, the motion against Zahir failed with a unanimous vote of 70.

Meanwhile, the motion against Nasih failed with a majority vote of 64-12, with two abstaining.

President of Civil Service Commission (CSC) Mohamed Nasih.

The committee found that during the 2023 elections, Nashath extracted information from the EC’s database to create fake membership applications, which he sold to political parties. The committee also found that all three commissioners conspired to rig the election in favor of a specific political party. The trio was also accused of tampering with the reregistration process.

The committee also found the commissioners shared a list of members who signed for a new political party with the President’s Office, and actively worked to impede the registration of the new political party.

They were also accused of creating fake applications with the aim of having a political party dissolved, and working to prevent the party from meeting the 3,000-membership mark.

Meanwhile, Abdul Salam and Thoha were also accused of serious misconduct, including filing a corruption case against a former attorney general despite having sufficient evidence to prosecute the case.

Nasih, who survived the vote, had been accused of spying on the commission’s staff. However, the committee did not find evidence to support the claim.