Corruption watchdog Transparency International Bangladesh has said the recent elections to three city corporations cannot be called free and fair.
The Bangladesh wing of the global body made this observation public in a presentation delivered before journalists at a conference in Dhaka yesterday.
The paper presented was styled “Tracking the process of Dhaka South, Dhaka North and Chittagong City Corporation Elections 2015.”
TIB Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman said: “The components needed to call an election free and fair were absent from the polls to Dhaka North, South and Chittagong city corporations.”
The paper is based on qualitative and quantitative studies conducted in three cities. One of the conclusions of the research is that the limitations in the existing election rules worked against the cause of holding free and fair polls.
The study says despite having the power to more, the regulatory activities of the Election Commission were limited to issuing warning notices and fining councillor candidates.
Because of the election regulator’s weaknesses, except for one, all the mayoral candidates in the two Dhaka city corporations surpassed their expenditure limits, said the TIB.
It said the EC did not take any immediate steps regarding the dilemma centring deployment of troops, which created disputes. Election officials took part in vote rigging and helped others in occupying polling centres, free-style stamping on ballot papers, barring media workers, and so on.
It was seen that political parties directly motivated the elections which by nature are non-partisan. Ruling party men occupied centres on a large scale to ensure victory. Some centres witnessed clashes between fractions of the ruling parties.
TIB slammed the opposition parties for failing to ensure agents in all centres and the decision to quit without taking the consent of the mayoral candidates.
The study recommended that the government rectifies the flaws in the Election Rules 2010 and the EC applies its constitutional powers for free and fair polls in future.
TIB also recommended the appointment of an “ace person” who is above all pressures and political influences and introducing electronic voting machines and closed-circuit television cameras to stop forgery.
