Contacted, a number of politicians of the two major parties have termed the National Opinion Survey 2013 published by the Dhaka Tribune yesterday as unbiased.
The survey reflects peoples’ perception on the national parliamentary election due tomorrow, they said.
BNP Standing Committee member Abdul Moyeen Khan said the survey reconfirms the earlier surveys which clearly indicated that 80-90% of the people of Bangladesh want the 10th parliament elections under a neutral, non-partisan government.
“Under the present circumstance in Bangladesh, this survey has proven beyond doubt that the people of Bangladesh have already rejected this election for the fact that 153 public representatives have been elected MPs in a parliament of 300 without having to go through any election process,” he said.
Communist Party of Bangladesh President Mujahidul Islam Selim said the the survey did not produce any outcome that was significantly different from the public views.
“It is a equation drawn from the perspective of the general people, I agree to what pubic has responded in survey. I think the survey results are consistent with public views,” he said.
According to the poll, 77% of the 2438 respondents opined that an election without main opposition BNP was not acceptable, 71% said the country was heading in a wrong direction. Majority of the respondents was against the ban on Jamaat-e-Islami.
They anticipate a low turnout in the election due tomorrow.
Awami League noted that the survey was neither bias nor could reflect the actual landscape. The party claimed that the outcome showing lesser number of supporters of awami league compared to BNP was untrue.
After consulting several AL leaders, the party’s Deputy Office Secretary Mrinal Kanti Das told the Dhaka Tribune: “I do not want to term it as biased. However, it could not produce the real picture of the [entire] country through the survey.”
He said some issues like the war crimes trial reflected public attiude but rest could not expose the reality.
In reference to previous surveys done by Bangladeshi media (not mentioning any name) on the same issue, Mrinal said: “This survey has shown that the supporters of Awami League had increased but we did not believe the fact that BNP’s supporters were larger in number.”
Some leaders of the parties were unwilling to comment.
They were yet to read the report in detail, they said.
Secretary General of Bangladesh Shamajtantrik Dal Khalequzzaman termed the survey a “good survey,” but refrained from commenting any further on it.
“I have learnt about the survey from a talk show and as far as I understood, it was a good survey. However, I will not comment on it until I finish reading the whole survey,” he said.
Workers Party of Bangladesh President Rashed Khan Menon and Ershad-led Jatiya Party Presidium member Anisul Islam Mahmud said they were yet to read the survey and would not comment until finishing reading it.
Krishak Sramik Janata League president Kader Siddique said: “I have heard about it two or three days back, however, I have no comment on it.”
