Bangladesh News

The Election Commission (EC) at last decided yesterday to correct the mistakes in the updated voter list in just eight days by sending its 1.4 lakh staffs on door-to-door visits from next Friday. Earlier, it took 22 days for updating the voter roll without checking the authenticity of information with the same manpower.

EC Secretary Abdur Rashid Sarkar said they initiated steps to correct the updated voter list. “We sought a budget of Tk 10 crore from the finance ministry for the task,” he said at a press briefing after a meeting with the advisers to the caretaker government at Bangabhaban yesterday.

The EC, which is yet to decide on rescheduling the January 21 polls date announced November 27, allocated eight days for the entire task of deletion and inclusion of names in the voter list updated last July-August at a cost of Tk 24 crore.

Around 1.4 lakh staff, who worked for the updating and will now go door to door, will have three days (December 8-10) to detect fake and duplicate names in the updated list and collect applications from eligible voters yet unlisted.

After collecting the information on prescribed forms, they will submit it to the assistant registration officers (ARO) within the next two days, an EC Secretariat circular said yesterday.

Over 6,000 AROs will arrange hearing for deletion of names on December 13 and 14 and then will bring the changes in the voter list on December 15. But before that, they will have to send their recommendations to the EC seeking directives as the EC alone can amend the voter list after announcement of election schedule.

Earlier, while updating the voter list, the EC also did not publish the draft of the updated electoral rolls.

The updated voter list with a staggering 9.30 crore voters triggered enormous controversy over its correctness. It showed at least 1.28 crore unaccounted for voters as per the 2001 census report of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS). According to the BBS report, there were 8.02 crore eligible people to be registered as voters.

EC Secretariat documents showed that 2,11,63,408 persons registered themselves during the updating while EC officials across the country deleted only 45,08,680 names from the list that had 7.64 crore voters.

The National Democratic Institute (NDI) revealed on Saturday that a total of 1.22 crore names registered in the updated list are either excess or duplicate.

The NDI submitted its report to acting Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Mahfuzur Rahman, who rejected it.

But the council of advisers to the caretaker government discussed the matter and asked the EC to make the voter list credible by correcting its mistakes.

The acting CEC and the EC secretary, who attended the meeting of the council of advisers yesterday on special invitation, informed the caretaker government of the EC plan for correcting the voter list.

Upon returning from Bangabhaban, the EC secretary told reporters that the EC staffs will visit door to door with the updated list for checking.

He sought cooperation from all political parties, NGOs, and the media in the task for correcting the updated voter list. The NDI will assist the EC in the task, he added.

An EC Secretariat press release also urged eligible people yet unlisted to register their names.

Meanwhile, printing of the updated voter list has not been completed yet although the EC Secretariat ordered to complete the task in November.

On receiving instructions from the EC Secretariat, district election officers, who will act as the registration officers, last night said they will have to face tremendous difficulties in starting the task from this Friday.

Schoolteachers, who worked as assistant officials and AROs for updating the voter list, are now busy with examinations at their schools. “The examinations will continue at least until December 10. Besides, it is difficult to communicate with the schoolteachers within two days,” a district election officer told The Daily Star last night.

Another district election officer said the forms for correcting the voter list are not available at the district election offices. “We are communicating with the EC Secretariat for the forms,” he added.