Dhigali and Aattey plead not guilty as court hears charges in 13.6 million‑cigarette heist

Businessmen Ahmed Arif (Aattey), owner of Lotus, and Mohamed “Dhigali” Waheed, CEO of Apollo Holdings, have pleaded not guilty to the charges raised against them over the theft of more than 13.6 million cigarettes seized by Maldives Customs.

The Prosecutor General’s Office has charged 10 individuals in connection with the high‑profile heist, in which two 40‑foot containers of smuggled cigarettes, valued at over MVR 100 million in lost import duties, vanished from the custody of Maldives Ports Limited (MPL) after being seized by Customs.

According to the prosecution, Dhigali, Aattey, and former senior Customs officer Muaz Ali worked together to plan and execute the operation. All three are charged with:

• Conspiracy to exercise unauthorized control over another person’s property, and  

• Complicity in exercising unauthorized control over another person’s property.

Investigators believe the trio coordinated the logistics, tampered with surveillance systems, and arranged for the containers to be swapped with fakes before removal from the MPL terminal.

Senior Customs officer Zivar Ismail, and MPL employees Ahmed Shaheem and Ahmed Firushan, are charged with:

• Unauthorized possession of another person’s property, and  

• Conspiracy to commit unauthorized possession.

Another MPL employee, Hussain Samih, and Apollo Holdings boat captain Adam Waheed, who allegedly transported the containers by sea, are charged with possession of another person’s property.

Two additional suspects, Mohamed Alamin Mia, a Bangladeshi national, and Hassan Abdul Rahman, 28, of K. Thulusdhoo, are charged with participation in the encroachment of another person’s property.  

Both have pleaded guilty and requested plea agreements with the state.

Dhigali and Aattey formally denied the charges during Sunday’s Criminal Court hearing. The case entered preliminary hearings a month ago and remains in that stage.

Both men were previously arrested early in the investigation but were later released on conditional bail. At the time, prosecutors said the court granted bail due to insufficient evidence linking them directly to the theft, a position that has since changed following the full investigation and filing of charges.

The stolen cigarettes were originally seized by Customs and stored at the Hulhumale' port under MPL custody. The investigation revealed:

• The two genuine containers were replaced with identical decoy containers.  

• The boat used in the operation had its name and registration altered.  

• The stolen containers were transported to Thilafushi, where they were destroyed.  

• Police later recovered parts of the containers from a site in Thilafushi.

The case triggered major internal audits within Customs, MPL, and other state institutions due to the scale of the breach and the involvement of senior officials.