Progress Being Hindered Under Pretext of Environmentalism: MP Shiyam

Many projects that could bring development for the Maldivian people are being hindered under the pretext of protecting the environment, said MP Ahmed Shiyam (Naifaru).

MP Shiyam said that nations like America and China spoke more about the environment than the Maldives did, and they do not delay in providing their people with the services they need to provide. However, he said, whenever an airport to make life easier for the citizens is being worked on: environmentalist groups would be sent to those places to try and stop the work.

MP Shiyam said that the former President Yameen had done much to slow the erosion of beaches of inhabited islands. He had done so by installing coastal protection measures. He said that many islands, including his own constituency, had received such protection through the granite structures that had been installed as coastal protection.

MP Shiyam said that environmental concerns had been raised when the bridge was under construction. He pointed out that this government had benefited a lot from the bridge, to the point that it could not be used by the common citizen when foreign officials came to visit.

He called on environmentalists to refrain from opposing infrastructural projects that would make peoples’ lives easier.