Rise in Covid Cases: All local body polls postponed
The Election Commission yesterday postponed all elections, including the first phase of union parishad and sixth phase of municipality polls, due to a steep rise in coronavirus infections.
It also postponed the by-polls to Laxmipur-2 constituency.
The EC in a meeting yesterday made the decision that upazila-level scrutiny committees would be formed to determine whether the EC would file cases against "dual voters", people who have become voters twice by obtaining two national identity cards.
The Daily Star obtained a copy of the meeting's working paper.
The EC has identified that there are 5.30 lakh "dual voters" in the country.
POLLS POSTPONED
The commission postponed the by-polls to Laxmipur-2 constituency, the first phase of union parishad and sixth phase of municipality elections due to the coronavirus situation, EC Additional Secretary Ashok Kumar Debnath told reporters after the meeting at the EC office in the capital.
All the elections were slated for April 11.
The polls will be held after the situation improves, he added.
On March 3, the EC announced the schedule of by-polls to the Laxmipur-2 constituency as the parliamentary seat of independent lawmaker Mohammad Shahid Islam alias Kazi Papul got vacated after his conviction in Kuwait in a criminal offence.
On the same day, it was also announced that polls will be held in 371 union parishads in the first phase and 11 municipalities in the sixth phase.
In the first phase of the UP polls, 73 chairman candidates have already been elected uncontested, while 1,429 candidates are vying for the chairman posts in the rest of the UPs.
Amid the pandemic, the EC already held Chattogram City Corporation polls, several by-elections to parliamentary seats, and five phases of municipal elections.
"DUAL VOTERS"
Additional Secretary Ashok said the meeting decided to form committees at upazila level to settle the matter of "dual voters". He said the committees will scrutinise whether a person has become a "dual voter" intentionally or mistakenly or in good faith.
"Cases will be filed if we find anybody became a 'dual voter' with ill intentions during the scrutiny," he said.
EC officials said the commission has identified 5,29,607 "dual voters" from 2008 to February this year.
They said in most cases, the EC has locked their NID cards. Many became voters in two places without knowing. Again, many have given different names, addresses, dates of birth in two places to become "dual voters".
In the meeting's working paper, the EC has instructed the field-level officials to lodge cases against 1,058 people who have taken two NID cards and so far cases were filed against 556 people.
In another development, the meeting also decided that it would send letters to all the registered political parties, asking them about the progress in achieving the target of 33 percent women representatives by 2020, said Ashok.
This move was made following an amendment to incorporate this provision into the Representation of the People's Order (RPO) in 2008, and failure to meet this means the EC can cancel registration of a political party, according to EC officials.
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