Pro-China Maldives president’s party sweeps parliamentary vote

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Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu’s party has swept to victory in the country’s parliamentary elections, according to local media reports, giving the China-friendly leader a stronger political mandate.

Local news websites reported on Monday that the party had won 71 seats in the 93-seat parliament as preliminary results were reported from Sunday’s vote.

The landslide victory by Muizzu’s People’s National Congress in the tourism-dependent archipelago nation, south-west of India, has brought into focus the ongoing India-China rivalry in the region.

Muizzu was elected president last year on an “India Out” programme capitalising on resentment of the Maldives’ huge northern neighbour in the Muslim-majority country of just over half a million people.

He then irked New Delhi by paying a state visit to China in January and signing a raft of agreements on the economy, trade and infrastructure.

He also asked India to withdraw its military personnel, numbering about 88. The troops conducted naval patrols and operated a radar and two helicopters, which were used in part for medical evacuations to the mainland. The troops are now in the process of leaving, with an Indian technical team set to replace them, according to India’s Ministry of External Affairs.

India is at odds with China after its troops clashed with their Chinese counterparts at their disputed border in eastern Ladakh in 2020, in violence that killed at least 24 men, mostly Indians. Both countries have increased their troop deployments at the border, and New Delhi is beefing up its navy in response to a perceived challenge from China in its maritime domain.

India is a member of the Quad, alongside the US, Japan, and Australia, and is drawing closer to Washington in security, technology, defence and other areas in a partnership seen as an effort to counteract China. It sees its immediate regional neighbours as a core sphere of interest under its Neighbourhood First policy, and has separately voiced concern over Chinese research vessel visits and infrastructure projects in Sri Lanka.

“Earlier India had a free hand in the neighbourhood,” said Praveen Donthi, senior analyst with the Crisis Group in New Delhi. “Now the competition is increasing and expanding.”

He added: “This is a reality India is going to live with, and it has to become a little more nimble with diplomatic engagement with its smaller neighbours.”

Balancing its relationship with the two big countries in its neighbourhood has been a long-running theme in Maldives politics. The regional spat has affected the Maldivian tourism industry, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi in January promoted India’s Lakshadweep archipelago in a series of social media posts seen as a snub to India’s smaller neighbour.

According to the Maldives Ministry of Tourism, the number of visitors from India, formerly its top source of tourists, plummeted 38 per cent in the first quarter of this year to 34,847. The number of visitors from China rose 288 per cent to 67,399 during the same period.