Ali Thameem
WCM Nihaya Ahmed has been crowned champion of the National Women’s Chess Championship 2025.
Nihaya won this championship with a score of 7.5 points after nine rounds. Although she was tied on points with 15-year-old Fathmath Zoya Hassan Saeed (1513), their head-to-head game in round seven was used as the tiebreaker. Nihaya had played as white and won that game.
With a classical FIDE rating of 1586, Nihaya started the tournament ranked second behind Eena Abdhulla Hassan (1610), but went on to win all but two games. Her only setbacks came when she played as black, being defeated by Aini Munthazim in the third round, and settling for a draw against Maryam Laisa Abdhul Rasheed (1434) in the fifth. Laisa would go on to finish third, just 0.5 points behind Nihaya and Zoya.
Following her conquest of this national championship with a performance rating of 1724, Nihaya’s classical rating is projected to rise by 22 ELO, back into the 1600s.
Undisputedly the greatest female chess player in Maldivian history, the 26-year-old Woman Candidate Master (WCM) has now won nine out of ten championships since the women’s category was introduced in 2014.
The women’s National Chess Championship 2025, held from 2nd to 8th of this February, saw 39 players compete over nine rounds of classical chess at the Hulhumale’ Chess Arcade.
