In the last significant national outing, way ahead of the presidential polls of October 2023, the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) managed to stay ahead of an otherwise demoralised and at times discredited Opposition identified with jailed former President Abdulla Yameen. However, the MDP lost the mayoralty of capital Male, once its popular bastion to the Opposition, to Yameen’s one-time Housing Minister and his Progressive Party of Maldives-People’s National Congress (PPM-PNC) combine’s deputy leader, Dr Mohamed Muizzu.
According to official figures, Muizzu polled 61 percent of votes in the lowest-ever 20-percent turnout in the city, which in turn accounts for 40 percent of the nation’s population. The national turnout itself was an equally low 40 percent, half the past figures. Despite claims to the contrary, MDP insiders attributed the less-then robust performance to inner-party rivalry and other inherent deficiencies that had gone unaddressed in the past.
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