UPAZILA POLLS IRREGULARITIES
EC stops sifting thru complaints
New Age 29/1/09 Staff Correspondent
The Election Commission on Wednesday abruptly stopped looking into the complaints regarding irregularities, stuffing of ballot boxes, capturing of polling centres, tempering with the results and intimidation in the January 22 upazila elections.
‘We will look into no more complaints. From now on they [the people who want to lodge complaints regarding upazilas polls] need to go to the election tribunal,’ election commissioner Muhammed Sohul Hussain told reporters in his office on Wednesday.
The commission stopped reviewing the allegations a day after it had suspended the results of seven upazilas although it had found proof of irregularities, stuffing of ballot boxes, capturing of polling centres and intimidation in at least 41 upazilas, according to sources.
Asked whether elections to any more upazila parishads or any more results of the elections may be suspended as the commission secretariat continues to receive complaints from defeated candidates, Sohul replied in the negative.
The commissioner said official results of the polls, except for 13 upazilas, where results and elections were suspended or postponed, will be published through gazette notifications in two to three days.
‘Within 30 days after publication of gazette notifications of results, aggrieved candidates could go to the election tribunal set up in each of the districts,’ Sohul said.
Complaints of ballot box stuffing, capturing of polling centres and intimidation in the upazila elections have started pouring in at the EC secretariat from January 25. About 180 complaints have so far been lodged by candidates demanding re-elections to a number of polling centres or to all the centres in some cases till Wednesday.
The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party on Wednesday submitted complaints against election results of eights upazilas and demanded re-elections there. The BNP’s office secretary Rizvi Ahmed submitted complaints along with documents and photographs of fraud in the polls.
The upazilas are Morrelganj in Bagerhat, Birganj in Dinajpur, Comilla sadar, Bauphal in Patuakhali, Jamalpur sadar, Madaripur sadar, Sarishabari in Jamalpur and Fatikchari in
The commission initially decided to look into the complaints and take action against the people responsible. According to its decision, all the three commissioners examined some complaints in three consecutive days till Monday and found massive irregularities, including stuffing of ballot boxes, capturing of polling centres, intimidation, tempering with the result sheets in at least 41 upazilas.
The commission on Monday in principle decided to cancel the results of 20 upazilas and some centres in other upazilas, the sources in the commission secretariat said.
But the commission suspended the results of seven upazilas — Banchharampur in Brahmanbaria, Araihazar in Narayanganj, Teknaf in Cox’s Bazar, Kaliganj in Gazipur, Mehendiganj in Barisal, Muradnagar in Comilla, and Raipura in Narsingdi — where Awami League-backed candidates were unofficially declared chairmen-elect.
Asked whether the commission has suspended the results of only seven upazilas against massive irregularities in a large number of polling stations in a number of upazilas only to make people believe it has taken action, Sohul said, ‘It is irrelevant. Once the elections are over, complaints, if any, could be lodged with election tribunals.’
Asked about the nature of the complaints, Abdul Baten, conducting officer of the upazila polls, told New Age most complaints were lodged against local lawmakers for influencing the administration and capturing polling booths. A case was lodged against Abdur Rahman Bodi, lawmaker for the Cox’s Bazar 4 constituency, of the ruling Awami League on charges of assaulting polling officials at Teknaf on the polling day.
[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe
__,_._,___