Nihan: Nasheed lying about his backbone

Parliament majority leader Ahmed Nihan Hussain Manik has accused former President Mohamed Nasheed of playacting and lying about having pain in his backbone.

Guesting the DhiTV program “Khabaru Therein” on Wednesday night, Nihan said that Nasheed’s backbone had started paining as soon as he was sentenced to 13 years in prison.

And that he had talked about nothing but his backbone the last one-and-a-half years.

“There is no one in this entire country who hasn’t heard about Mohamed Nasheed’s backbone. Young or old. His backbone has been paining the past one-and-a-half years, ever since he was put in prison,” said Nihan.

Nasheed was given permission to travel to UK in January because the doctor had advised a backbone surgery for him.

A video emerged last week of Nasheed at the Hay Festival held in Wales, participating in the chair race.

The news was well-documented by international media.

“Wasn’t it just yesterday that we saw him participating in a chair race? Being pushed around in a chair by someone. Is this something someone with a backbone problem can do? It’s all lies. Isn’t he misleading the people?” said Nihan.

Nasheed has now been granted “political refugee” status in UK.

He was put under anesthesia and had a medical procedure done on him on April 19.

Details of the procedure have not been made available from his office, or by his legal team.

Nihan said that it was not the first time for Nasheed to mislead the people.

He said that Nasheed had only pretended to work to protect Maldivian environment.

“The next thing is him misleading the people by pretending to serve the Maldivian environment. He took the Cabinet under water and played a world-class drama. He hasn’t done anything for the environment,” said Nihan.

He went on further to say that Nasheed’s only contribution to Maldivian literature had been the book “Dhagandu Dhahana.” And the next thing he had done was to write inflammatory pieces in the “Sangu” newspaper to create dissent between the government and people of the country.

“Mohamed Nasheed has made no further contribution to Maldivian literature or information distribution system. It was of no benefit to the Maldivian people.”