The cause of Monday’s blast, witnessed by journalists who were waiting to meet President Abdulla Yameen on his return from Haj in Saudi Arabia, was not immediately clear.
Footage aired on local TV channels showed chaotic scenes as Yameen’s staff tried to evacuate the injured from his stricken launch, bobbing on the waves close to a jetty, to a police boat.
“There was an explosion at President Yameen’s official speedboat near Male jetty. The president is unhurt, but the first lady was slightly injured,” Mohammad Hussain Shareef, minister at the president’s office, said.
Yameen, 59, is a controversial figure both at home and abroad. He rose to power in a bitterly contested presidential election in 2013.
Yameen had landed earlier at the main international airport of the Maldives, an island chain with a population of 400,000, and was making the short final journey to Male by water with his entourage.
“We don’t know if the explosion was from explosives or the inboard engine,” said Shareef, reached by telephone from Sri Lanka.
A witness saw Yameen walking and helping an injured victim soon after the explosion, which occurred when his boat was just two metres from the main jetty.
His wife, Fathimath Ebrahim, fell as she emerged and was carried off the presidential boat by soldiers. A rear door was partly blown off its hinges in the blast.
Fathimath Ebrahim was evacuated to Male’s main hospital, along with a bodyguard who was seriously hurt and a presidential aide who suffered slight injuries, Shareef said.
