Phone usage (Maumoon, Political Parties, Government and Businesses)

I got curious today after reading an amusing blog post about an unsolicited SMS message someone had supposedly received from a mobile phone number registered to the current President of the Maldives Maumoon Abdul Gayoom. Now, this is a time of intense political competition between the various candidates camps and an originating number on a SMS is pretty easy to spoof, so I'm not sure if it really did originate from the said number. But that's not what really struck me...

What got my attention was the fact that there now was a publicly listed mobile phone number registered to Maumoon. I've never before seen a mobile number registered to him listed on the Dhiraagu e-Directory and a quick search through various old snapshots of e-Directory data that I had confirmed that there indeed had been none - atleast none up until early June which was the last e-Directory snapshot I had. Anyway, I grabbed a fresh snapshot of the e-Directory and spent a little while running some interesting queries on the data.

Here is some of what I found:

Numbers listed on e-Directory:
Mobile305198
Landline (Male')24423
Landline (Islands/Resorts)8750
Phones/Customer on Avg2.9


Political parties:
Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party92
Maldivian Democratic Party11
Social Liberal Party6
Adhaalath Party6
Islamic Democratic Party6
Jumhooree Party2
Peoples Party2


Registrants (Top 5):
Dhivehi Raajjeyge Gulhun Pvt. Ltd.833
Maldives Police Services200
State Electric Company Ltd.191
Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital167
Maldives Customs Service164


Most common names (Top 5):
Mohamed Rasheed1273
Ibrahim Rasheed1250
Ahmed Rasheed1089
Ahmed Mohamed1088
Mohamed Ali1087


Government (Top 5):
Maldives Police Services200
Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital167
Maldives Customs Service164
Min. of Defence & National Security141
President's Office139


Ministries (Top 5):
Min. of Defence & National Security141
Min. of Atolls Development114
Min. of Health76
Min. of Finance & Treasury76
Min. of Environment Energy and Water67


Businesses (Top 5):
Villa Shipping & Trading Co. Pvt. Ltd.163
Universal Entp. Pvt. Ltd.156
One And Only Reethirah149
One & Only Kanuhura125
Kurumba Village124


And finally...

Maumoon Abdul Gayoom
Mobile16
Landlines3


Note: The information presented was obtained using the entries on the Dhiraagu e-Directory (as available today).