The Election Commission will issue voter cards when National Identity Card (NID) services will be transferred to the Ministry of Home Affairs, Election Commissioner Md Alamgir has said.
Even if Election Commission loses NID authorization power, there will be no issue in the polls management system, he told reporters at his office on Thursday.
The election commissioner noted that there is no chance of giving away the voter information server to the ministry as it was the property of the Election Commission.
“Our server will remain ours. However, we may share information with the Ministry of Home Affairs if they need it,” he added.
Regarding the use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) in 150 seats in the next general polls, he said: “We will use the existing EVMs in as many seats as we can if we fail to buy new ones.”
If Bangladesh Planning Commission feels that our proposed project is financially feasible, then new EVMs will be purchased, he added.
On October 10, the Cabinet gave conditional approval to the draft of the “National Identity Card Registration Act, 2022”, with the provision of issuing the NID after birth.
At the same time, according to this law, the NID services were to be transferred from the Election Commission to the Security Services Division of the Ministry of Home Affairs.
For a long time, the Ministry of Home Affairs was trying to get authorization for the NID card management system.
All the services related to NID are now being taken under the Ministry of Home Affairs.