China loses bet in Maldives after Malaysia

Yameen, on the left, lost to Solih (right). Yameen was seen as a pro-China leader.

Voters in the Maldives have thrown out an incumbent president, Abdulla Yameen, in an extraordinary rebuke reminiscent of the Malaysian elections in May this year.

The voters in the Maldives have voted out a China-backed president who jailed political opponents and judges and drew his country closer to China during a tumultuous five-year term.

The U.S. State Department has congratulated the Maldives on its peaceful democratic election, saying it took note of the opposition candidate’s win.

Ibrahim Mohamed Solih declared victory in Sunday’s vote, which was widely seen as a referendum on democracy in the nation that was holding only its third multiparty democratic elections, and a vote on whether the country should kowtow to China.

Malaysia’s May elections, a shocker, saw the fall of yet another regime that cosied to the Chinese. The Malaysian ex-PM Najib Razak was hoping that Chinese money would boost his chances. He was also hoping that China would bail his regime tainted with the 1MDB scandal.

The Maldives election results are yet another blow in Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Malaysia’s shutting down many BRI-linked projects has reduced China’s influence.

It also undermines the BRI, which we said was littered with holes and abandoned projects from Myanmar to Sri Lanka and now possibly the Maldives.

While the Maldives president has not conceded defeat, the massive turnout and the high vote obtained by the opposition could still be challenged.

Official results won’t be announced until Saturday, allowing possible court challenges of the vote.

The opposition presidential candidate Ibrahim Mohamed Solih has declared victory in the Maldives with independent newspaper website mihaaru.com reports that Solih has 58.3 percent of the vote, with nearly 92 percent of ballots counted.

Independent election watchdog Transparency Maldives tweeted that Solih has won “by a decisive margin.”

More than 260,000 of the 400,000 citizens of the Maldives were eligible to vote at about 400 polling stations across the islands that comprise the Indian Ocean archipelago.

Results released by the Elections Commission showed Solih, popularly known as Ibu, securing 133,808 votes compared to the 95,526 for incumbent Yameen.