AL's job tougher than BNP's

The Awami League may face more hassles than the BNP to pick single mayoral contenders in the upcoming municipality polls.

The ruling party has more than one prospective candidates in almost all the 236 municipalities to go to polls on December 30; so much so that in one municipality, there are as many as nine people who want the party ticket.

The Daily Star has talked to the grassroots leaders of different political parties in 192 municipalities and found that around 600 leaders are working to get the AL's mayoral nomination while the number of such people is 236 in the BNP camp.

Many of the AL-ticket aspirants said they were determined to contest the elections even if they do not get the nominations.

If they do so, the party may find itself in a tight corner because in the last municipal elections, held in December 2010 and January 2011, the AL-backed mayoral aspirants could not fare well mainly due to rebel candidates and intra-party conflicts.

The BNP has a lot less aspirants than the AL does, as many grassroots-level leaders of the party are unwilling to contest the polls for fear of police harassment.

Some of them are already behind bars while some are on the run as they are facing cases in connection with widespread violence during the BNP's anti-government movement centring the January 5 elections in 2014 and the first anniversary of the AL government that assumed power for the second time in a row through the parliamentary polls.

The AL, however, will not face problems in all the 192 municipalities surveyed by this paper. It has single mayor aspirants in 16 of them.

In around 70 municipalities, four or more people are trying to win the ruling party's blessings. In the rest, the number of leaders working to get the AL endorsement ranges between two and three in a municipality.

If the grassroots fail to pick a single candidate for a mayor post, they will have to send the list of aspirants to the AL Parliamentary Board which will finalise the nominee, according to the grassroots leaders.

As for the BNP camp, the ruling party's archrival has single mayor aspirants in 59 municipalities. In most other places, it has only two leaders who want the party ticket.

The main opposition Jatiya Party men are preparing for the polls in around 30 municipalities of Comilla, Rajbari, Patuakhali, Kurigram, Gaibandha, Dinajpur, Rangpur, Joypurhat, Chapainawabganj and Natore. In most of them, it has single candidates.

With the elections ahead, Jamaat-e-Islami grassroots too have become active in over two dozen municipalities of Bhola, Gaibandha, Thakurgaon, Dinajpur, Nilphamari, Chapainawabganj, Bogra, Sirajganj, Rajshahi, Habiganj and Sylhet districts. It has single mayor aspirants in each of them.

This is for the first time the municipality polls will be held on party lines. The polls have already generated much heat in the political landscape as both the AL and its arch-foe BNP are stepping in the battle of ballots for the first time since the 2008 parliamentary election.

The elections are also a popularity test for the parties. So, both the AL and the BNP are focused on picking single candidates for the mayoral posts.

From a meeting of its Central Working Committee on Thursday, the ruling party issued specific directives for the grassroots in this regard.

AL Joint General Secretary Mahbubul Alam Hanif has already warned that the party will take strict actions if any grassroots leader contests the election defying the party decision.

A team of senior BNP leaders too have started working to choose single mayoral candidates. BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia will give the final approval to the list they are preparing, party insiders said.

Unlike in the parliamentary polls, the electoral laws in the municipal elections do not allow the parties to nominate more than one candidate.

In the national elections, a party can choose more than one person to file nominations in a constituency. But it needs to formally inform the returning officer about its final choice before the allocation of electoral symbols.

Once the final candidate is allocated the party's electoral symbol, nominations of the others become invalid automatically. And they cannot contest the election as independent candidates either.

But in the municipality polls, a party must nominate one candidate for each mayoral post. This means the nomination aspirants have to ensure at the very beginning of the electoral process that they get the party endorsement. So, those who will not get the tickets will have time to contest the polls as independent candidates.

The report is prepared by Pankag Karmakar, Partha Pratim Bhattachrjee, Rashidul Hasan, Prabir Barua Chowdhury and Shakhawat Liton in assistance with The Daily Star's district correspondents.