President-elect Dr. Mohamed Muizzu has said that the number of members of the Parliament should be reduced if the number of members increases with each term.

Dr Muizzu made the remarks in an exclusive interview with One Media today.

According to the law, parliamentary seats are allotted on the basis of membership for every 5,000 people. Therefore, at the end of each term of parliament, the number of constituencies increase if the number of people eligible to vote increases. A total of 93 lawmakers will have to be elected to parliament next year, including the new constituencies to be elected to parliament. The current 19th parliament has 87 members.

Dr. Muizzu said it was not right for lawmakers to grow with the growing population.

"The size of parliament keeps growing with the population under the existing law and now it's more than 90, and I personally believe that this is a bit much," Dr. Muizzu said.

Dr. Muizzu, however, said that reducing the number of lawmakers cannot be done overnight and it should be done through discussion in parliament.

"When the present number is doubled and made into a population of 10,000 people, the representation of people living in small islands may be reduced, which will be addressed. But I don't want to say a specific number at present. Instead, it is best to reduce it through dialogue. Parliament is getting bigger population growth, and it's best to put an end to it and replace it with a cap and then reduce the size of the population representative by increasing it to 10,000," Dr. Muizzu said.

Dr. Muizzu said that having an MP for every 10,000 people is not an issue at all, but that he would not ask the parliament to make the immediate change.

"If they reduce the number of members to 50, we will have to come out with a formula to have two MPs for each atoll, representing smaller populations like V. Atoll," Dr. Muizzu said.