The president-appointment search committee to find suitable candidate for appointments to the Election Commission has received names of 329 people as recommendations.
“Political parties proposed 136 names, professionals recommended 40 while individuals proposed 34 names and suggestions of another 99 people came through emails,” Cabinet Secretary Khandaker Anwarul Islam said on Saturday.
Speaking to the media after two rounds of meetings between the panel and eminent citizens at the Supreme Court judges’ lounge, he said the panel would now sort out the names.
Responding a query on eminent citizens’ proposal to make the names public, Cabinet Secretary Islam said, “It’s just a suggestion. The committee will decide what to do and how.”
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The search committee opened the talks as part of its efforts to scope out the most suitable candidates for the next Election Commission.
Two groups of 20 citizens from various walks of life were invited to take part in separate meetings on Saturday.
The first meeting, which started at 11:15 am, was attended by most of the invitees but some of them were not seen.
Former attorneys general AFM Hasan Arif and Fida M Kamal, former president of the Supreme Court Bar Association Yusuf Hossain Humayun, senior lawyers Mansurul Haque Chowdhury, Rokanuddin Mahmud and Shahdeen Malik, former additional attorney general MK Rahman, former cabinet secretary Ali Imam Majumder, Dhaka University Pro Vice-Chancellor Prof Maksud Kamal, Prof Borhan Uddin Khan and Prof Asif Nazrul of DU's Law Department, President of the Asiatic Society Mahfuza Khanam, CEO of non-governmental organisation Brotee Sharmeen Murshid and President of the Fair Election Monitoring Alliance (FEMA) Munira Khan were in attendance.
The search committee then sat down with another group of eminent citizens at 1pm.
Golam Rahman, editor of the Bangla daily Ajker Patrika, Zafrullah Chowdhury of Gonoshasthaya Kendra, Abed Khan, editor of daily Jagaran, Saiful Alam, editor of Jugantar, Shyamal Dutta, editor of Bhorer Kagoj, AK Azad, managing director of Channel 24, Farida Yasmin, president of the Jatiya Press Club, Mozammel Babu of Ekattor Television, Tasmima Hossain, acting editor of daily Ittefaq, Zahirul Alam, news editor of NTV and journalist Swadesh Roy attended the meeting.
The search committee is set to hold discussions with a total of 60 distinguished citizens, including lawyers, teachers, bureaucrats, doctors, researchers and election monitoring organisations.
The final meeting is scheduled for Sunday.
