IMHO Nokia is not abandoning Maemo platform. It is being combined with Moblin. There will be compromises, no doubt, but I believe this was a good choice.

Also I think that Nokia has more interest in developing the GUI rather than debugging the kernel crashes. Moblin is (according to my very little knowledge of it) more about the kernel; making it work lightning-fast on selected mobile platforms. Combining these two aspects just might make Android take the competitor(s) more seriously.