Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) has stated it is working to prosecute individuals over the ventilator scandal in 2020 based on cases that were not filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC).
ACC twice submitted corruption charges against 11 officials at the Ministry of Health who were involved in the failed procurement of ventilators during the COVID-19 outbreak. The PGO initially sent back the charges for further revisions and later decided not to file charges against the ministry officials, which included then-Minister of Health Abdulla Ameen, members of the ministry’s bid committee, and senior ministry officials. ACC has since decided to file the case.
At a parliamentary committee meeting, the Spokesperson at the PGO Ahmed Shafeeu said that ACC was instructed to review specific points of the process to purchase the ventilators and that PGO will begin the prosecution process once the commission investigates and submit the names of the guilty parties. Senior Communications Officer of the ACC Nishan Mohamed Didi said its investigation is in the final stage and the commission will submit the case to the PGO soon.
Irregularities in procuring ventilators for the Maldives were first detected in the COVID-19 compliance audit conducted on the health ministry by the Auditor General’s Office (AGO) in 2020. As such, the audit revealed that Dubai-based Executors General Trading was paid 90% of the quoted price in advance to procure 75 ventilators in April 2020, of which only 15 were procured. The audit report also revealed the company was selected without assessing its financial and technical capabilities, in addition to not obtaining advance payment and performance guarantees.
The AGO has begun the arbitration process over the ventilator scandal at the request of the health ministry after the Dubai-based company failed to respond to repeated requests to return the amount paid by the Government of the Maldives, which amounts to USD2 million. The government had also refused to use the 15 procured ventilators, as they did not meet the specifications.