Candidates will launch their electioneering today ahead of the municipality polls but they are still confused whether they can use symbols during the campaign.
The Election Commission will decide today whether the candidates will be allowed to use symbols before December 14, the day symbols will formerly be allocated among the contestants.
Election observers said this is discriminatory as partisan candidates will get an upper hand over others raising a further question of the EC’s intention to hold a free, fair and credible election.
They said their suspicion grew as candidacy withdrawal date will expire on December 13 and symbols of candidates were yet to be allocated. “How will the candidates do their campaign without symbol?” questioned one of them.
When contacted, Election Commission Secretary Sirazul Islam said: “Candidates will start their campaign from tomorrow (Wednesday) but whether the symbol will be used in the campaign is yet to be decided.”
Election Commissioner Shah Nawaz said: “I said earlier that election campaign would start from December 9. I do not know whether any other decision was made in this regard. That’s it.”
As per the election code of conduct, the electioneering in favour of any candidate cannot be launched three weeks before the election date.
Former election commissioner M Sakhawat Hossain said as all the candidates are not contesting the polls under party banner discrimination is obvious because the party nominated candidates will get upper hand in election campaign as local people have already known about their party identities.
“This time mayoral candidates are contesting the polls under their respective party banners, much to their advantage but the independent candidates will become the victims of discrimination as they are yet to get symbols,” he said.
Apart from this, the councillor candidates are non-partisan and they are also yet to get any symbol, said the former election commissioner.
“Then how can they be able to launch their campaign. Candidacy is also not finalised as the withdrawal date is still valid. It will create confusion. In local government election, symbol is very important, voters have to be familiar with the symbol as symbols used in this election is different from party ones.”
He also said the Election Commission is putting the independent and councillor candidates in disadvantageous position and it is the responsibility of the commission to create a level-playing field.
The municipal election is being held politically partially for the first time in the country. Some 22 registered political parties have joined the election race fielding a total of 711 candidates for mayoral posts.
