Former Fenaka MD Saeed convicted of corruption over MVR 848K Blazon contract

Ahmed Saeed Mohamed, the former managing director of Fenaka Corporation, has been found guilty of corruption in connection to a procurement contract awarded back in 2018.

The case against Saeed stems from an MVR 848,000 contract signed between the state utility service provider and Blazon Inc in 2018.

An investigation by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) uncovered that Blazon was paid by Fenaka before they completed the contracted work and without checking if they had completed the work.

In December 2024, both Saeed and Mariyam Dheena Solih – who was serving as Fenaka’s procurement head at the time - were charged with misuse of official authority in the case.

The Criminal Court found the Saeed guilty of the charge on Sunday afternoon.

However, the judge has yet to issue the sentence.

Saeed is also on trial on similar charges linked to an MVR 11.3 million contract signed between Fenaka and Kaizaan Investment in 2023 for the purchase of an ice plant built by the latter in L. Maamendhoo.

Fenaka and Fisheries Ministry had signed an agreement to develop an ice plant in Maamendhoo on April 20, 2023. According to the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO), instead of developing an ice plant, Fenaka had purchased an existing one for a highly inflated price of MVR 11.3 million as proposed by Kaizaan.

PGO said the decision was taken without consulting with the Tender Evaluation Committee and despite Fenaka's business plan stating that the ice plant was not a financially viable project.

The decision to purchase Kaizaan’s ice plant was made during a board meeting on September 7, 2023. According to the PGO, Saeed, despite being in attendance, failed to disclose that Fenaka had initially planned to develop the Maamendhoo ice plant internally.

The purchase agreement between Fenaka and Kaizaan was signed the same day.

The corruption conviction against Saeed comes three days after a special audit report publicized by the Auditor General’s Office (AGO) flagged MVR 2.2 billion financial irregularities by the state utility company between 2021 and 2023.

Some of the serious irregularities flagged in the audit report includes:

• The award of MVR 1.4 billion in procurement contracts without a competitive bidding process.
• The procurement of refurbished generator sets that were passed off as brand-new ones for MVR 17.4 million, despite their actual value being MVR 2.9 million.
• The procurement of equipment before contracts were signed.
• The award of MVR 105 million in delivery contracts to a supplier that did not have a ship to carry the deliveries on.
• The award of contracts to companies linked to Saeed’s family.
• The award of multiple no-bid contracts to companies linked to the MDP.

In a statement earlier on Sunday, Saeed insisted that he acted in strict compliance with rules and regulations, and slammed the audit report as “rushed”, “politically motivated” and “misleading.”

Fenaka, which is heavily in debt, has been plagued with allegations of corruption throughout different Maldivian administrations.

The Auditor General’s Office recommended a criminal investigation into the irregularities uncovered in the special audit.