Municipality polls in May next year

The Election Commission (EC) yesterday decided to hold the next polls in 133 municipalities in a single day in the first week of next May at a meeting marked by heated arguments among the election commissioners.

The launch of electronic voting system was also at the heart of the arguments and the EC failed to arrive at a conclusion on the issue.

Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) M A Syed was in favour of stretching the polls over a few days and got the support of Election Commissioner M Mohammad Ali.

Another election commissioner, Safiur Rahman, differed on the plan, saying it would not be wise to hold elections on several days.

"We made a mistake by holding union parishad elections over two months. We had to spend Tk 15 to 16 crore more because of this staggered elections," Safiur said.

On electronic voting, Safiur said it was not possible in the next polls, adding: "India could not introduce the system across the country in the last 26 years."

"How will we be able to launch the system overnight without a political consensus?" he asked.

He also said that the United Nations Development Programme turned down the EC's request for fund to launch electronic voting.

Although officials of the EC secretariat supported Safiur's proposal for a one-off voting, the CEC disagreed.

"We should hold the ballot in several days to ensure it is free and fair,'' Syed said. "If the law and order is peaceful, the elections may be held in a day."

Criticising Safiur's position, the CEC said: "Why are you thinking negative? We had decided earlier that electronic voting would be launched in next elections," the CEC said.

Meeting sources said Safiur protested Syed's remarks, saying the EC had never taken such a decision.

Safiur's comment raised the hackles of the CEC and trigged a heated debate for minutes.

Officials of the EC secretariat told the meeting that the tenures of 144 of 260 municipalities expire between March 15 to August 24.

According to election law, polls in the corporations will have to be held between March 15 to September 11.

Of the 144 municipalities, tenures of 10 expire after May where elections will be held later.

The government has allocated Tk 10 crore to conduct the polls.

On preparations for holding the voting, EC officials said work on the updation of the voters' list would be finished by January 30.

The last municipality elections were held from February 23 to February 25 in 1999.

The CEC presided over the meeting held at his office. Election Commissioner M Munsef Ali were also present.