Nasheed: I have forgiven Maumoon

Former President Mohamed Nasheed has said that he has forgiven his predecessor President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

Ex-President Nasheed currently in the UK under asylum talked to journalists in Colombo, Sri Lanka, yesterday through video conference.

Nasheed have been criticizing the former President Maumoon before and after his win over Maumoon in the first democratic election in the country in 2008. He has also served time for publishing critical articles on the Maumoon government.

Yesterday, Nasheed said that he wants to bury the hatched with President Maumoon and that a future cannot be built without letting go of the past.

President Nasheed said that he has forgiven President Maumoon and are in talks with the former President to form a coalition with the Maumoon faction of the ruling party, PPM.

Without giving details, President Nasheed said that he went to Colombo last month to attend important meetings to plan strategies to overthrow the government of President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom within the laws of the Constitution.

The relationship between President Yameen and President Maumoon was affected after President Maumoon expressed his opinions against some of the bills being passed through the Parliament by the government. After President Yameen ordered the PPM MPs to vote for certain bills, President Maumoon, also the President of the ruling party, PPM, said that those bills are against the regulations of the party and ordered not to vote for them. The bills in question include the leasing of islands without a bid process and the anti-defamation bill that constricts the freedoms of expression.

During the internal turmoil of the ruling party, Foreign Minister of the Yameen government from day one, Dunya Maumoon, the daughter of President Maumoon, resigned from her position.

The Al-Jazeera investigative report released last week accused President Maumoon of asking USD 100,000 in exchange for working with President Nasheed on his offer. And the report said that Nasheed gave USD 50,000 to President Maumoon.

But both Presidents have denied the allegations as false.