The Parliament today decided not to act on a constitutional basis offered by the Supreme Court to include vacant seven seats when counting the total membership of Parliament.
Villinigili MP Saud Hussain from the opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) proposed not to include the seven vacant seats when counting the total membership. Galolhu Uthuru MP Eva Abdulla from the Democrats supported the proposal.
It was passed with the votes of 25 MPs while two MPs voted against it.
Provisions stating that the total membership of Parliament will be counted by excluding the vacant seats were first included in the Rules of Procedure after seven MPs left their seats to join the government.
But the provision was repealed and a new provision was added to the Parliament's rules after the Attorney General's office asked the Supreme Court to strike down the previous provision on counting the total membership.
After it was removed from the rules, the Supreme Court ruled that the old provision was unconstitutional but the court decided that it could not offer a legal remedy regarding the new provisions in the case filed by the state.
Speaker Mohamed Aslam today proposed to decide on the repeal of the provisions.
However, the debate was prolonged and a new proposal was passed to change the way the number of MPs is counted and exclude vacant seats when counting the total membership of Parliament.
