Election materials including ballot papers have already reached the offices of the returning officers concerned, as the Election Commission finalises its preparations for the city corporation elections in Dhaka and Chittagong tomorrow.
Arrangements are already in place to send the election materials to the polling centres by today, before voters head to cast their ballots from 8am tomorrow; the elections will take place until 4pm tomorrow without any interval.
The mayoral and councillor candidates already wrapped up their election campaigns last midnight as per the election rules.
The government has declared a general holiday tomorrow in Dhaka North City Corporation, Dhaka South City Corporation and Chittagong City Corporation so that all voters can exercise their voting rights.
As part of the Election Commission arrangements, around 50,000 polling agents will perform their duties in the three city corporations on election day.
Four magistrates will be present at each of the 143 wards in three cities —57 in DSCC, 36 in DNCC and 41 in CCC – to conduct mobile courts until Wednesday.
The magistrates along with around 80,000 law enforcers including personnel from the police, RAB, BGB, Coast Guard and Ansar, will deal with the incidents of election violence through summary trials.
However, the army will stay inside the cantonment as the Election Commission retreated from its previous decision to deploy three battalions of the army in the three cities.
In DSCC, there are 1,870,753 voters who will cast their ballots at 889 polling stations; in DNCC, there are 2,345,374 voters who will vote at 1093 polling stations; in Chittagong, there are 1,813,449 voters who will exercise their voting rights at 719 polling centres.
Preparations in Chittagong
CCC Election Returning Officer Md Abdul Baten said the necessary election materials have already arrived in the port city, adding that the materials would be distributed among 719 presiding officers today.
Thirty BGB platoons have already been deployed across Chittagong, while the police, Ansar and RAB forces would be deployed at the poll centres from today.
Each general poll centre and vulnerable poll centres would get 22 and 24 law enforcers respectively, including armed personnel.
Around 17,000 police and Ansar men would be deployed for security inside the polling centres in Chittagong, while the police, RAB and BGB would be deployed as striking forces outside the centres. The CMP have also set up round-the-clock check posts with CCTV monitoring in the port city’s entry points.
Besides, 140 executive magistrates and 10 judicial magistrates have been assigned for maintaining law and order situation during the polls across Chittagong city.
Fourteen vigilance teams, led by the assistant returning officers of the local EC office, are also monitoring all election activities.
Abdul Baten, the CCC returning officer, said the Election Commission would take help from law enforcement agencies to conduct raids at the city’s residential hotels, rest houses, guest houses and other areas to check for any outsiders staying in the city to disrupt the elections.
The EC would also secure the MA Aziz Stadium, the place where the results would be announced from, the returning officer added.
“We will take control the entire stadium area from today to set up a four-tier security system. None was allowed to move across the area on election day as well as 12 hours before and after the election date,” he said.