A Coconut is Messing Up This Country’s Elections

In America, out voting scandals involve ID laws, hanging chads, and outright disenfranchisement.

In the Maldives, their big voting scandal this year involves a coconut.

A cursed coconut.

A cursed 4-inch coconut inscribed with a Koranic verse written in Arabic.

To quote Paul Fidalgo:

A magic coconut has disrupted Maldivian elections and now there is an investigation into the magic coconut and OH GOD I WISH I WAS KIDDING

So how is this coconut disrupting an election?

Though the population of the Maldives is Sunni Muslim, continuing belief in magic is widespread in rural areas. Coconuts are often used in rituals and inscribed with spells.

…

[News website] Minivan said its source had suggested the coconut “was a lesson for islanders not to practise black magic in an attempt to influence voting, and that the polling area would be closely monitored to prevent such activities from occurring”.

…

A magician summoned by police established that the coconut was innocent, local officials have said. No arrests have been made.

Well, innocent this time.

As one commenter at The Guardian noted, the coconut will now become a “political prisoner… surely a case for Amnutsy International.”