Judiciary sector halts recruiting new employees to cut expenses

Recruitment for new employees to courts and the judicial sector has been temporarily halted in light of Maldives’ current economic state.

Department of Judicial Administration (DJA) in a circular revealed the measures taken to cut down on recurrent expenditure with reference to the judiciary’s plans for the prevailing year following the President’s Office’s decision to take all possible measures to reduce the state’s expenses.

The measures that will be implemented in the judiciary sector to cut down recurrent expenditure is as follows:

• Temporarily halting training programs apart from programs that are conducted with aid from foreign parties
• Overtime work to require approval from supervisors and supervisors to monitor overtime
• Temporarily halting recruitment of new employees
• Temporarily halting inauguration ceremonies for new courts

DJA has instructed judicial courts and entities to adhere to the circulation from the date of publication.

The government has taken serious measures to reduce state expenditure in light of Maldives declining economic state and increased debt. In this regard, the government has reduced recurrent expenditure for matters such as transportation and expenditure for new projects. President Dr. Mohamed Muizzu has also decided to reduce political posts and cancel certain events planned to commemorate various occasions, including Independence Day. 

The steps came following a warning by Erdem Atas the World Bank Country Economist and Resident Coordinator for Maldives, for immediate expenditure cuts to overcome its current economic vulnerabilities.

In a statement on X, Atas said that the economic vulnerabilities Maldives is now facing is a combination of debt stock accumulation in the last 10 years.

Besides this, he said that the continuous high fiscal and current account deficits over the same period also negatively impacted the country's economy.

Meanwhile, Fitch Ratings - a global credit rating agency - had downgraded the Maldives' long-term foreign-currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) from 'B-' to 'CCC+'.