President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih has stated implementing the existing Law on Prioritising Dhivehi Language could be an important step towards promoting Dhivehi language. The president made the statement addressing the special function held at Dharubaaruge convention centre, to mark the International Mother Language Day.
Addressing the function, President Solih said reviving the Dhivehi language is a national responsibility that every Maldivian citizen should shoulder. The president said while the Law on Prioritising Dhivehi Language is in existence, implementing it could be an important step towards promoting Dhivehi language. In this regard, he noted the Dhivehi Language Academy is working on formulating Dhivehi language alternatives for ministries and other state run institutes.
Referring to the efforts of the Dhivehi Language Academy to promote Dhivehi language, President Solih appreciated their efforts to provide information linguistic researchers would need, from under one roof. The president said Maldivians should be proud of the Dhivehi language, just the way we are proud to be Maldivians. He urged citizens, especially journalists, to use grammatically correct Dhivehi. In this regard, he noted the importance of documents written in Dhivehi adhering to set grammatical rules.
The International Mother Language Day is observed on February 21 every year. The theme of this year's International Mother Language Day is Indigenous Languages as a Factor in Development, Peace and Reconciliation.