Prepared to do everything necessary for PPM campaign: JP Leader Gasim

Leader of Jumhooree Party (JP) Gasim Ibrahim has said that he is prepared to everything necessary to facilitate victory for presidential candidate of Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) Abdulla Yameen in the second round of the presidential election scheduled for Saturday, 16 November.

Gasim said this while speaking to reporters after the JP council meeting tonight, to decide which candidate to endorse for the second round.

“I will talk to the PPM leadership. God willing, from now on I am prepared to do everything necessary to facilitate this,” he said.

Gasim said that both PPM and Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) made proposals to JP prior to JP’s decision to support Yameen, and that both parties’ proposals were similar.

“It’s better that we don’t go into detail. Our decision was not entirely based on that anyway. If it’s a coalition, our party also should benefit from it. I believe we will,” he said.

He said that this decision does not mean JP is enemies with any party.

“We discussed the matter in great detail before arriving at a decision. Today’s council meeting, unlike other meetings, was attended by a large number of council members,” he said.

Gasim, who earlier said that he will not support any candidate in the second round, said that he would not support any candidate under normal circumstances, but the present situation is ‘not normal’.

The JP council meeting started at 4:15 p.m. today and lasted four hours.

PPM supporters congratulated Gasim as he left Kunooz after the meeting. MDP supporters, on the other hand, called him a ‘traitor’.

Out of the 20 council members present at the meeting, 15 voted in favour of supporting Yameen, while five abstained. The members who abstained were former Transport Minister Dr Ahmed Shamheed, President of JP Dr Ibrahim Didi, JP Secretary General Hassan Shah, Moosa Rameez and Dr Hussain Rasheed.