The Economic Ministry has published the second amendment to the Foreign Direct Investment Policy after the wording of its first amendment issued earlier this week was called into question.
The earlier publication had read that 100 percent foreign-owned companies can invest to operate air transport services in the Maldives.
This would allow such companies to invest in terminal services, airport traffic control services as well as ground control services.
But this amendment brought in much debate on social media and questions on whether or not the government had planned to hand over the country's air traffic control to a private investor.
This in turn made Economic Minister Fayyaz Ismail respond via Twitter and later through a hastily scheduled press conference.
He had said via Twitter that in any airport in the Maldives, the air traffic operations would be controlled by the State. '
Minister Fayyaz said that to remove any misunderstanding, the Ministry would be changing the wording to reflect this clearly.
As promised the Economic Ministry had republished the revised FDI policy and the new policy read that companies with 100-percent foreign ownership can administer Services incidental to air transportation excluding services and facilities mandated to the government of the Maldives including Air TrafficControl Services, Customs, Immigration, Aviation Security, etc.
