Maldives’ state broadcaster gives “Voice” to Maldivians’ xenophobia

Maldives’ state broadcaster Public Service Media’s (PSM) radio channel Voice of Maldives (VOM or Dhivehi Raajjeyge Adu) yesterday morning, in its program of live discussions with the public, chose the topic that borders on the current local fears of diseases, that have been eradicated from Maldives, been “re-introduced” into our archipelago by expatriates who come here to work. This follows public anxiety at the recent discovery of Filaria cases from expats.

Some callers-in said that expats have to be medically screened before their arrival in Maldives.

This comes at a time when there are allegations that some Maldives’ private clinics “sell fake medical certificates” or “false and fraudulent” clean health bills “to make money”.

While I am not clear who gets to choose the topics for VOM’s “Baajjaveri Hendhuneh” (“Good Morning”) program, staff of VOM should have the common sense to forecast that such a topic will allow Maldivians’ hidden xenophobia to raise its ugly head again – and it sure did.

Callers-in criticized unpatriotic citizens for destroying Maldives’ society by uncontrolled and unchecked number of expats being recruited and brought into Maldives which has resulted in the overcrowding of spaces, resulting in Maldivian families been unable to enjoy leisure time outdoors, at parks, etc.

Of course we are already aware that our senior citizens harbor fears of expats “destroying” our mother tongue Dhivehi and grabbing job opportunities that could otherwise have gone to Maldivian youngsters. And let’s not even mention that some Maldivian youngsters do still engage in violent confrontations with expats whether in the form of mugging Bangladeshi expats for “money and phones” to sustain their junkie habit or throwing "projectiles" (found on the streets) at Bangladeshi expats out of sheer xenophobia. The Internet information awareness rubbed Gen Z or not, some of our youth still seem stuck in the uncivilized barbarism of the Stone Age.

It must be a Herculian task to chose 365 topics for 365 days every year and I guess we could forgive VOM staff if they are running out of creativity and imagination in choosing topics that could attract real “constructive criticism”.

While the Oscar awards, and now most other ceremonies' telecasters, have the technology of broadcasting shows with a 6-second or more seconds delay, in order to prevent the telecasting of "indecent" moments, I was wondering whether VOM has such technology or not. But even then, with such a topic, I wondered whether the whole program would need to be censored because it was a topic that was sure to raise the ugly head of xenophobia in Maldivians.

The then opposition-leaning Minivan News was demonized for publishing “anti-establishment” comments and I wonder whether VOM is obliviously welcoming penalization for broadcasting such xenophobia at a time when Maldives’ diplomatic footing is at a precarious stage due to a new kind of geopolitical game that have come into play with a new administration or government.

Whether the program was broadcast in our native language Dhivehi, “foreign” countries have their own way of “translating” stuff which they deem necessary for their policy making and diplomatic decisions. Hence, choosing a topic that would surely broadcast to the world that Maldivians still have a long way to go before our latent and dormant xenophobia can be buried for all times to come could be an awkward and embarrassing outcome for VOM.