Bangladesh
CEC Schedule of National Elections to be announced in October: CEC
Dhaka, July 28: Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Kazi Habibul Awal said, "As far as I remember, the schedule has to be given 90 days in advance. However, it is not supposed to happen before October. It's not fixed yet. However, I can guess that the schedule will be announced sometime in late October or mid."
The CEC said this to the media when asked about the preparations for the 12th National Parliament election at the Election Commission building on Thursday (July 27).
He said, "Preparation is a continuous or ongoing issue. We have a roadmap, a plan for this - we are moving ahead accordingly."
Kazi Habibul Awal said, "All in all, more than 1,000 elections have been held. The elections were good and fair and impartial. No such complaint has been received. But it cannot be denied that there were two or four isolated incidents, we are sorry for that."
Is there any pressure in the national elections? In this regard, CEC said, "There is no pressure on us from any quarter. Keeping in mind the provisions of the constitution, we are proceeding towards the election. Not feeling any pressure. It cannot be denied that the assistance of the police and the district administration has been adequate. I cannot say the future for sure. However, I am confident that the administration and the police will perform their duty in the twelfth national election as well."
Mentioning political differences as a major challenge in the National Assembly elections, he said, there are clear differences between political parties. If the mutual political trust between the parties is not restored then it may pose a big challenge in the election.
Can you bring BNP to the election? In this context, he said, "The responsibility of whether we can bring BNP or not is not imposed on us. It is a political issue. There is a political crisis over whether BNP will come or not. It will be determined by them whether BNP will come to the election or not. But we want to neutrally say that you should all take part in the elections. The crisis is not in the Election Commission, but in politics. To deal with the crisis, political parties must be resolved. We will only organize elections, we are looking at you."
