Coast Guard Ignored In Military Promotions, Many Discontented

As many service people in the Maldives National Defence Force have received promotions recently, MNDF servicepeople in the Coast Guard who were not promoted have expressed their dissatisfaction.

A serviceperson who serves in the Coast Guard told The Maldives Journal, on the condition of anonymity, that more than 40 service people were promoted to the rank of Warrant Officer, but none of those promoted were from the Coast Guard. They said that this shows that the "higher-ups" do not appreciate the work of those who maintain, use, and manage "expensive vessels".

The only personnel from the Coast Guard section who had been promoted already were of a very high rank and had not been active in the field. "No serviceperson who was active, day and night, on the Coast Guard vessels had been promoted", they said.

They said that even though servicepeople from the other corps had been promoted, the promotions had not been made based on any real criteria or principles. They mentioned that promotions had been made with no regard to the actual training that would be required prior to such a promotion. "Someone could be promoted to the rank of Captain, and may have been promoted to the next rank even before they have served a year at that rank", they said.

As military personnel have to abide by certain rules and regulations, there is little that they can do about this inequality of promotion. Military personnel are prohibited from freely expressing their opinions or staging demonstrations for their rights.