CEC joins office after long leave
Chief Election Commissioner Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmed joined office this morning after enjoying a leave for one and a half months.
After staying in the USA for one and a half months, the CEC returned home yesterday.
The CEC joined the Election Commission (EC) secretariat office at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar in the capital around 10:00am today, EC Director (Public Relations) Asaduzzaman Arzu told The Daily Star.
He left Dhaka on March 3 at a time when the EC was struggling to hold the upazila elections in the country in a free and fair manner.
He decided to leave the country, allowing Election Commissioner Abdul Mobarak to oversee the upazila elections of third, fourth and fifth phases, according to a source close to Rakibuddin.
In the first two phases held on February 19 and 27, activists of the ruling Awami League adopted violent and unlawful means, including taking over polling stations and stuffing ballots, when Rakibuddin was heading the EC.
The violence and excesses by AL men annoyed him, said sources in the commission. He reportedly sent a message to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, seeking her assistance in controlling violent AL men. But the CEC did not get any proper response.
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