A two-week hectic campaign for the first-phase upazila election in 97 upazilas ended at midnight, with chairmen and vice-chairmen hopefuls making last-ditch efforts to woo voters ahead of the tomorrow’s poll.
A festive mood prevails in almost all polling areas and no major incident was reported till filing this report at 8pm.
Both major political parties – Awami League and BNP – desperately tried to ensure single candidates in every upazila, but failed to do so many cases.
The ruling Awami League and the BNP expelled many of their rebel candidates from their parties in a move that created division among the grass roots.
The ranks and files of the parties claimed that this sort of expulsion would have an impact on the poll result.
Though this is a local body election, the Awami League and the BNP took it seriously to prove their popularity among the grass roots.
Both parties are eyeing the first-phase upazila poll which they believe will help them adopt strategy to contest the other phases of election.
In the last minute of their electioneering, the contenders brought allegations and counter-allegations against each other in different upazilas.
However, the Election Commission said the voting atmosphere was fine and law enforcers started keeping a constant vigil to avert any untoward situation.
Though the BNP boycotted the January 5 polls, its local level leaders have been vying for the upazila elections and the central leaders campaigning in favour of the party-backed candidates to ensure their victory which they believe will fuel to intensify their upcoming movement.
In the last upazila elections in 2009, Awami League-backed candidates won around 400 chairmen posts while the BNP-backed candidates boycotted the polls.
The EC has taken all kinds of preparations for holding the poll tomorrow in a free and fair manner in 97 upazilas under 40 districts.
The commission had already announced the schedule of upazila poll which would be held in four phases.
The commission would announce this week the schedule of fifth phase’s poll, Election Commissioner Md Shah Newaz said.
A total of 1,274 candidates are vying for the poll for three posts in 97 upazilas.
Of them, 432 candidates are contesting the chairman post, 513 vice-chairman post and 329 reserved women vice-chairman post.
Of 1,64,78,172 voters, 81,91,537 are male and 82,86,635 female, and they will be voting in 97 upazila polls.
The commission has set up 6,995 polling centres and 43,290 polling booths for the polls.The commission yesterday deployed army in every upazila in the first-phase poll and one platoon army has been deployed in every upazila.
Border Guard Bangladesh has been deployed from Sunday. The other law enforcement agencies will also be deployed in the upazila polls.
However, our Chandpur correspondent reported that rebel Awami League candidate in Kachua upazila barricaded the road and the upazila became isolated from the rest of the country for around two hours, demanding that a single candidate be immediately picked up from the upazila to vie for the election.
Witnesses said supporters of rebel Awami League candidate Shahjahan Shisir and vice-chairman candidate Nazmul Alam Swapan cut trees and barricaded the road. He threatened that the road would be barricaded till announcement of a single candidate in Kachua upazila.
In the upazila, Ayub Ali got the party blessing for the chairman post.