Former Minister of Legal Affairs at the President's Office Aishath Azima Shakoor has pleaded at Criminal Court not to accept some witnesses presented by the state against her. The former minister has been charged with being an accomplice to money laundering and providing false information to the state.
At the hearing, Azima suggested evidence indicating that witnesses against her shall not be allowed to testify. Witnesses against her include former President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom, former President of Anti-Corruption Commission of Maldives (ACC) Hassan Luthufee, current President of ACC Muawwiz Rasheed and deputy CEO of Bank of Maldives (BML) Mohamed Shareef.
Azima explained that since President Yameen has also been charged with the same crime, he cannot testify against her due to a ruling of the Supreme Court of Maldives. She believes Muawwiz and Luthufee were indifferent after they discovered that funds from leasing of islands by Maldives Marketing and Public Relations Corporation (MMPRC) was deposited the bank account of SOF Private Limited.
When Azima noted Luthufee was forced to testify, the public prosecutor dismissed the accusations suggesting media reports cannot be used to disallow witnesses from testifying. However, the judge explained via a letter submitted to Criminal Court, Luthufee explains that he was forced to testify. The public prosecutor requested the court to consider the video analysis of Luthufee's testification.
Azima also claimed that unless President Yameen is found guilty, she cannot be charged with being an accomplice. Azima is being charged with providing false information to state authorities as she had stated that the embezzled funds deposited to President Yameen's account from SOF, the company that laundered MMPRC funds, had been deposited to an escrow account opened in BML under the direction of ACC. It was later found out that she had given a false account of the incident to ACC during the investigation.