Over 4,100 polls by Dec!

The Election Commission (EC) is going to hold more than 4,100 elections by December. Narayanganj City Corporation (NCC) mayoral election, and all district council and union parishad (UP) polls are to be held in this period.

Besides, EC has decided to hold by-polls to Sylhet-3 constituency on September 4, EC Secretary Humayun Kabir Khandaker said yesterday, following a commission meeting. Candidates can start their campaigns at 8am on September 1 and run them for 24 hours.

The Sylhet-3 by-polls, which was scheduled to take place on July 28, was postponed by the High Court on July 26 due to the imposed lockdown at that time. The Sylhet-3 constituency fell vacant after parliamentarian Mahmud Us Samad Chowdhury died of Covid-19 on March 11.

In the first week of next month, the EC will announce dates of by-election to Cumilla-7 constituency, NCC mayoral election, first phase polls for 167 UPs, second phase polls for UPs, and elections for nine municipalities, he said.

He said the commission will need to hold elections for more than 4,000 UPs by December.

In March, the EC decided that elections to all UPs will be held in several phases. On March 3, the EC announced the schedule for polls to 371 UPs in the first phase, fixing April 11 as the election day.

But it delayed the election due to Covid-19 and fixed the election date to be June 21.

In early June, the commission decided to postpone elections to 163 union parishads in Khulna, Bagerhat, Satkhira, Noakhali, Chattogram and Cox's Bazar due to a surge in Covid-19 cases.

Elections to the remaining 204 UPs were held on June 21.

EC officials said elections for 61 district councils will be due by January 2022.

Besides, elections to nine municipalities were postponed due to Covid-19 as well, and the five-year tenure of another 20 municipal mayors will be completed soon.

The five-year tenure of NCC mayor will end on February 7, 2022, as the first meeting of the corporation was held on February 8, 2017. The NCC election was held on December 22, 2016.

The Local Government (City Corporation) Act 2009 requires holding city corporation polls 180 days before the tenure of the incumbent mayor ends.

The present EC will also complete it's five-year tenure on February 14 next year, as the current commissioners assumed office on February 15, 2017.

NID-wing officials at the meeting proposed registering data of people who were born on or before January 1, 2006, aiming to issue National Identity Cards (NIDs) to all citizens aged 16 and above and include them in the voter list when they become 18.

Those interested to get NID will need to go to the Upazila Election Office and apply, or they can register online. Citizens will be given NIDs only after completing biometric registration.

Humayun said a committee under Election Commissioner Brigadier General (retd) Shahadat Hossain Chowdhury usually observes NID activities. "The committee will review the matter and send their recommendation to the commission regarding the proposal."