Maldives protesters hijack Twitter convention hashtag, urge tourism boycott
The Maldives, best known in travel circles as a sunny Indian Ocean archipelago popular with discerning travelers in search of idyllic beaches and high-end resorts, is gaining a different kind of publicity this week at one of the world’s largest travel conventions.
Human rights activists are hijacking an official Twitter hashtag associated with the annual World Travel Market in London, using the convention to urge a boycott of the island nation's plush resorts.
Visitors to the fair's official hashtag, #WTM13, will discover streams of photographs depicting alleged instances of police brutality in the Maldives. Some appear connected to an alleged coup last year that ousted former President Mohamed Nasheed. The activists blame Qasim Ibrahim, a wealthy businessman who owns some of the country’s biggest resorts. Ibrahim took third place in the first-round voting during September’s election but claimed electoral fraud, which led the country’s Supreme Court to annul the vote.
The activists are using raw imagery and related tweets to detail their objections, with claims of corrupt hoteliers and politicians joined by gripes about the overall disparity of wealth in the country and its controversy-plagued democratic process.
So far, the Maldives’ tourism officials haven’t publicly responded to the campaign. Neither has Ibrahim, whose last tweet, on Monday, wished his followers a happy Islamic New Year. The World Travel Market has continued using the #WTM13 hashtag for its tweets about conference events.
The action comes in light of mounting tensions as the country's next try at a presidential election—already once aborted this year and rescheduled for Nov. 11—looms. Protestors risk arrest or imprisonment for their involvement in the Twitter campaign after the Maldives passed a new law just last week outlawing the call for or support of a tourism boycott in the nation. Tourism is a driving force of the Maldivian economy, accounting for up to a third of the country's GDP.
This isn't the first time protestors in the Maldives have looked to Twitter for their platform. Last year, the Twitter hashtag #SunnySideofLife, associated with the country's official tourism board website VisitMaldives.com, likewise became a platform for pro-democracy activists looking for a public forum to air their grievances.
