Chairman of Maldives Ports Limited MPL Mohamed Zaki says company officials have unearthed corrupt transactions worth MVR 8 million within the company.

In a tweet, he said that he was not able to suspend the fuel theft suspects at MPL under the government’s Zero-tolerance Policy. He said that at the company board meeting held on the 24th of this month, 3 members voted in favor of suspected employees while 4 board members voted against suspending the employees.

He added that employees from Fuel Supply Maldives are also involved in the huge theft and apologized for the crime.

In a separate statement, MPL said that these corrupt transactions took place during its operation amid the COVID-19 lockdown. It said that the company’s internal audit had compiled a report on the dubious transactions and that company is further probing these transactions.

MPL noted that the company had the employees allegedly involved in the corrupt transactions and have since forwarded the case to the Auditor General’s Office and Anti-Corruption Commission for further investigation.