Tight security to avoid post-election violence

Election Commissioner Brig Gen (retd) M Shakhawat Hossain yesterday said the government has taken adequate security measures to keep any post-election violence at bay.
Shakhawat said this at the BBC Sanglap on 'Election and security' at Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre in the city where Prof Muzaffer Ahmad and Mohammad Jahangir were present the panellists.
Shakhawat said army personnel, police, BDR and Ansar members will patrol different areas of the country to protect any kind of post-electoral violence.
Since the caretaker government holds the election, it is also its responsibility to tackle any kind of violence until an elected government takes sits in the state power, he added.
He said if anybody tries to make any barriers to keep a person refrain from exercising his or her voting rights and if the victims complain it to the responsible polling officer, he will take punishable action against the interceptor.
He further also said that it is not mandatory to carry the national ID cards to the polling centres as he can exercise his voting rights with the voter number and identifying the pictures.
Moreover, a limited number of camps on behalf of the political parties have been allowed to open in front of the gate of the polling centres where the voters can see their voter numbers and pictures, he added.
Shakhawat said, “We will take serious punitive actions against the politicised persons of the administration if it is proved.”
He reiterated that if any election observer is proved that he or she is not impartial, they will be blacklisted by the Election Commission (EC).
Prof Muzaffer complained that a number of deputy commissioners (DCs) did not follow the orders of the last caretaker government to tackle the post-election violence.
Although the EC has taken enough measures to tackle the rigging in tomorrow's elections, he said still there is a little change of rigging as the administration is not fully impartial.
He said the current EC has been empowered a lot compared to the previous ones and they can take serious action against any kind of electoral violence.