''If man can walk on the moon, we can unite to defeat our common carbon enemy'' -President Nasheed-

Today when I was goggling I accidently opened an article written by one of prominent writer, Nicolas Schmidle to The New York Times magazine on 8 May 2008 headlined as ‘ Wanted: A New Home for My Country’. The article began with the British documentary named ‘The Age of Stupid’, which talks about environmental catastrophe faced by the globe and the interview with the President. The documentary depicted that people are living in the age of stupidity and featured Mr. President Nasheed. The article said that Mr. Nasheed mentioned in November last year that the possible destinations for finding home for his 300000 people are Sri Lanka, India and Australia. The plan for buying land in these states seems to be establishing ‘sovereign wealth fund’ from the present revenues from tourism. The President’s quote saying in November that “We can do nothing to stop climate change on our own, and so we have to buy land elsewhere,’’. When documentary ended he announced that Maldives will become the first carbon neutral country in the world.

Paul Kench, a coastal geomorphologist at the University of Auckland, who made eight expeditions to the Maldives to research how islands form and evolve noted saying that Maldives will not survive in the recent sea level rise. He also said that President Nasheed’s announcements and comments were a political weapon. He said that it is a little bit unfortunate because Maldivians do not know how to deal with the change. In contrast the oppositions also said that Mr. Nasheed’s announcement may harm the tourism sector. The time he announced media that Maldives is going to sink, the international tour operators immediately started calling to inquire about it, which foresee a threat to tourism.

When the author asked about the details of the plan of the carbon neutral project Mr. President did not give any details and he replied saying that ‘I believe that the changes is on the horizon’

The author has described his journey with president and the interview in quite detail. These are few paragraphs wich caught my attention.

If there was any tension between science and Maldivians’ conservative religious values, Nasheed said he hoped to dampen it before the Italians arrived. “For your average fisherman, who feels very insignificant in front of God, they are finding it difficult to understand the connection between climate change and human activity,” he told me. “When people say changes in weather patterns are because of nature and not because of man, you re¬ally have to connect that: if humans can become carbon-neutral, then God could act in a different set of ways. But God has to be there in the conversation somewhere.”( From Article by Nicolas, 2009)

After a few minutes describing his government’s plans to improve life in Magoodhoo, Nasheed informed residents that the team of Italian re¬searchers was on its way to study the coral. “The safety of these islands depends on the coral,” he said. “We need to learn more about what’s happening with the earth. The world might not be that safe. We might not survive. We don’t know exactly what will happen. So we have to understand nature. It is God’s will.” Nasheed pushed his hair off his forehead and looked out across the crowd. “If these scientists are not able to save the Maldives,” he said, “then they won’t be able to save the world. ( from the Article from Nicolas, 2009)