Faruque Ahmed
The mayoral elections to two city governments of Dhaka south and Dhaka north and to Chittagong city have already assumed a highly partisan political colour with the ruling party’s manoeuvre to wrestle the control of the cities through the upcoming polls.
Though it is non-partisan local government election, Prime Minister and Awami League president Sheikh Hasina made the informal introduction of the party backed candidates for the two city polls from the Gonobhavan last week drawing immediate reactions from opposition political parties and civil society leaders watching the election process.
Ministers violating polls code
Meanwhile, in blatant violation of the electoral code of conduct, some ministers and state ministers on Tuesday last held separate meetings with leaders of the Awami League-led 14-party alliance in Dhaka and Chittagong cities and discussed the polls preparedness and party strategy to win the elections.
On Monday last four cabinet members and a prime minister’s adviser with the status of a minister also held another meeting with the AL’s Dhaka city unit leaders. The party backed candidate for Dhaka South Sayeed Khokon was also present at the meeting at the party chief’s Dhanmondi office.
In contrast, most BNP leaders are in jail and in the hide out even after having submitted nomination papers for mayoral and ward councilors’ posts. Moreover, when Awami League is using Gonobhavan and party chief’s political office to develop election strategy and run it, BNP’s central office is under long time shut and the party chairperson’s office is also under siege and stayed isolated from the reach of party leaders and workers. They have no place to sit together and run the city polls.
It appears that despite BNP’s decision to take part in the polls, a positive political landscape is so far totally absent to run election campaigns and hold the ground for a free and fair election overcoming challenges from the government camp.
This is because police have already made it clear that they would arrest anybody having criminal cases against them, no matter whether they are election candidates. Metropolitan Police has supplied a list of opposition accused vying for election to mayoral and councilors’ posts and one of the Election Commissioners has made it clear that they would not influence police for not arresting candidates if they are accused in any police case.
CEC urged to ensure fair polls
BNP leaders however said mere presence of cases is not enough; police can only arrest a person if the court has framed charges against him and issued arrest warrant in his absence from appearing before the court. But police said they have their power to arrest anybody anytime.
There is a widely held belief that the government has announced the city elections to divert people’s attention from opposition enforced blockade and hartals aimed at forcing the government to give mid-term parliamentary election.
It has therefore announced the city government elections to isolate the BNP-led opposition and marginalize them from national politics. Meanwhile, the cancellation of the nomination papers of BNP backed Dhaka North City Corporation election Abdul Awal Mintoo and Nasiruddin Pintu in the Dhaka South has left a highly depressive affect on BNP preparation to the mayoral polls.
In the South, BNP has three major candidates against Awami League backed mayoral candidate Syeed Khokon. But the question remains if the Election Commission (EC) fails to ensure a level playing field to the opposition while police is chasing their candidates, the chance of a fair election may remains a far cry. It may even force the opposition at the end to boycott the mayoral polls if they can’t fiend polling agents and such other functionaries in the polling stations.
A team of BNP leaders met Chief Election Commissioner Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmed on Wednesday last at his office and demanded creation of a level playing field and deployment of army on the polling day to keep peace.
Unfair polls feared
They have also demanded opening of their central office and release of party leaders and workers to run the election campaign. On top, they have asked the EC to ask police to refrain from arresting opposition candidates and their campaigners to make the election process fair and equally accessible to all.
The possibility of the mayoral elections to be fairly acceptable now depends much on the EC’s ability to play an independent role and make it freer and fair. The election officials denial that there is no government interference to the poll process despite news reports and TV footage of ministers and ruling party MPs frequent meetings to secure victory of their candidates, shows election is going to be highly flawed.
Observers fear the repeat of January 5 type election may be a last nail to the country’s free election system. Its consequences may be far reaching.
Source: Weekly Holiday