Holding officers at gunpoint, ruling party men snatched ballot papers, stamped on the symbols of their candidates indiscriminately, while law enforcers watched silently, several election officers, stationed in the capital during Tuesday’s city polls, have told the Dhaka Tribune.
“Casting fake votes began around 10am. All of a sudden, a group of four or five gun-wielding young men entered the polling centre, snatched ballot papers and started casting votes for the Awami League-backed mayoral candidate,” said an election officer who was carrying out duty at a polling centre at Baily Road in Dhaka.
“After being threatened, we informed police. They came alright but seeing the ruling party leaders, they went away, leaving us helpless in the face of the riggers’ guns. In fact, some of them even helped the riggers,” the officer said.
He also said that the Awami League men stamped the BNP-backed candidate’s symbol in the ballot papers for about 10 minutes, so that the votes cast did not look one-sided.
“Rigging was very easy as there were no agents of the BNP-backed mayoral or councillor candidates inside the centre. No matter how the votes were cast, we did our duty by counting the ballot papers and sending the result to the Election Commission,” the officer said.
Another election officer stationed at a polling centre in Dhanmondi told the Dhaka Tribune: “Around 2pm, some polling agents and policemen snatched some ballot papers from me and forced me to put my signature on them. I informed the local police station and RAB officials about the incident but they did nothing.”
He also said: “Around 12pm, in a booth at our centre, I found two people folding and dropping the ballot papers that they have already stamped, into the boxes. When I tried to stop them, they pushed me back to my room.”
Several other election officers, whom the Dhaka Tribune interviewed yesterday, gave similar accounts of open vote rigging by ruling party men with law enforcers playing the role of silent spectators.
One of them was surprised to see the number of votes cast in favour of the BNP-backed candidates.
“The total number of voters at our centre was 2,842. Until 1pm, only 643 actual voters dropped ballot papers. But in the next two hours, more than 2,000 votes were cast.
“After counting the ballot papers, we found that a total of 2,003 votes were cast. Of those, 1,620 were legal and rest were cancelled. It turned out in the end that the Awami League backed candidate got 1,010 votes while the BNP-backed candidate got 610,” he said.
Another election officer stationed at a polling centre in the Dhaka University area said: “Members of the ruling party’s student wing came to our centre around 12pm. They cast the votes of those people who could not come from their out-of-Dhaka workplaces.”
He also said: “Interestingly, there was no snatching or gun wielding at our centre. They came, stood in queue and peacefully cast the fake votes. None of them were voters of this area.”