Australian Human Rights Expert, Chris Sidoti visits Maldives

"My one major impression was just how much progress depends on the completion of the democratisation process through free and fair elections, constitutional reform and good lawmaking. The legal and political systems are in very rudimentary form and there are clear problems. That means that there is plenty of opportunity for progress without it being bogged down by having to deal with a highly embittered past. The question (and therefore the imminent challenge) will be whether the president is prepared to act as a real leader and preside over a process of genuine democratic and human rights reform or whether the whole process is all rhetoric without substance. Only time will tell."

Chris Sidoti's impressions following his human rights and civil society development speaker programme in the Maldives, February 2008.