EC not worried about JP U-turn

The Election Commission is not worried about Jatiya Party’s announcement on boycotting the next general elections, Chief Election Commissioner Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad said yesterday.
“It involves a political party and the party itself will take a decision about this. We will have to hold the elections within the time frame specified by the constitution,” he told reporters at the EC Secretariat.
Jatiya Party Chairman HM Ershad had announced on Tuesday that his party would not contest the polls since they are not going to be inclusive, and asked his party aspirants to withdraw their nominations.
About the current political stalemate, the CEC said, “It is a political crisis, and should be resolved politically. There is no way the crisis could be resolved administratively.”
Rakibuddin added, “We cannot yet see any progress towards a political consensus. What can we do if there is no political development?”
Asked whether a consensus can be reached after the JP announcement, he said it is definitely possible.
It is the responsibility of all political parties to take initiatives to reach a consensus and end the violence, he observed.
The parliamentary elections are scheduled for January 5.
Meanwhile, the EC yesterday decided to return to the UNDP the 40,000 ballot boxes that it had provided, as they are not “translucent”, unlike the previously shown sample.
“We have enough ballot boxes for holding the national polls. These 40,000 were brought for the upazila parishad election,” said Farhad Hossain, a senior assistant secretary of the EC Secretariat.