Uncertainties over bifurcated Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) elections deepened on Monday as the Election Commission (EC) announced it would not be able to publish a schedule for polls unless the local government ministry amended its May 30 gazette on the newly created Ward 57, comprising 13 areas in Sultanganj.
The EC asked two high officials of the local government and rural development ministry to amend the gazette by yesterday. The ministry has not published any amendment so far. An election commissioner said the schedule might still be announced on Tuesday if the amended gazette reaches EC within the day.
“However, if we do not get the amended gazette [today], it won’t be possible to hold the DCC South and North elections before Ramadan,” EC Mohammad Abdul Mubarak told this correspondent on Mo0nday.
Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad said: “If the gazette is amended, the EC will announce the schedule soon after a full commission meeting,”
The CEC also said the EC would make a final decision within this week for holding the split DCC polls within the shortest time. Whether polls would be held before or after Ramadan was still undecided, he said.
Following drawn-out bickering between the EC and the ministry over the inclusion of 13 new areas in Sultanganj to DCC South, the ministry on May 30 published a gazette announcing the areas as Ward 57, a new ward, and suggested that the seats in the ward be put under the reserved women councillor seats of ward 19.
The amendment the EC has asked for appears to an error in the language of the ministry gazette. According to section 4, sub-section 4, of the Local Government (City Corporation) Act 2009, the ministry must mention that its addition of a new ward was “amending the first schedule to include new areas in the city corporation,” Election Commissioner Zabed Ali explained.
He said the EC has already taken preparations for holding the DCC polls.
A draft schedule has already been created by the EC secretariat. The draft proposes July 7 for holding the polls.
On May 13, the High Court withdrew its stay order on holding the split DCC polls. On May 19, the local government ministry sent a letter to the EC for
holding the split DCC polls excluding 13 new areas of Sultanganj. But the EC refused, saying legal complications may arise.
The Dhaka City Corporation was split into two, South and North, on November 30, 2011, through passage of a bill that amended the 2009 local
government act. The then-mayor Sadek Hossain Khoka and 92 ward councillors left their offices after the amendment.
The last election of DCC was held in April 2002. Awami League, then the main opposition, did not participate, and Khoka, then a minister of BNP government, became mayor.