EC to start next round of talks after Feb 12

Trackback URL

Download PDF

The Election Commission (EC) adopted a plan yesterday to hold the second round of electoral reform talks with political parties after February 12, no matter what verdict the High Court (HC) delivers on the nagging BNP issue.

On that day the HC will resume hearing a writ petition filed by a faction of BNP challenging the EC’s invitation to M Saifur Rahman-led faction of the party to the first round of talks, which was scheduled for November 22 of last year.

The EC could not hold the talk with BNP in over two months due to the legal roadblock which also stalled the commission’s plan for embarking on the second round of talks with the parties in last December.

Meanwhile the caretaker government’s planned dialogues with the parties are being delayed as its advisers earlier said the interim administration will open its talks with the politicos after the EC’s stalling talks with the parties are wrapped up.

Under the circumstances the EC planned to go ahead with the second round of talks to finalise the electoral reform proposals without waiting for a resolution of the BNP issue, sources in the commission said.

The EC yesterday at a meeting discussed how and when to start the second round of talks and decided to wait till February 12 with hopes that the HC will deliver a decision on the BNP issue on that day.

As soon as the issue is resolved the commission will have its first talk with BNP to conclude the initial round that began last September.

“If the BNP issue is not resolved on February 12, the Election Commission will begin the second round of talks with other political parties, with whom it already had the first round,” an EC source said referring to the commission’s plan.

In that case, the EC will have its talk with BNP after the party’s internal dispute is resolved, the source added.

The EC, which has been mired in controversies for its handling of the two factions in BNP, is now waiting for the recent unity move to succeed, said the commission source.

“It will be better if they are united,” Election Commissioner Muhammed Sohul Hussain told The Daily Star yesterday without elaborating on the present status of the commission’s electoral reform talks.

Showing ‘doctrine of necessities’, the EC in last November invited Saifur-led faction of BNP to a talk scheduled for November 22, ignoring objections of Khaleda Zia nominated Secretary General Khandaker Delwar Hossain, who claimed his faction was the mainstream of the party.

Delwar-led faction challenged with the HC the EC’s move to invite Saifur-led faction’s Secretary General Hafizuddin Ahmed to the talks, prompting the court to stay the effectiveness of the commission’s invitation letter to Hafiz.

As a result, the EC could not hold any talk with BNP and the matter might not be settled until February 12, when the court will resume hearing the case.

According to the EC announced electoral roadmap, its electoral reform talks with the political parties were supposed to be completed between September and November of last year.

During the first round of talks the EC disclosed its plan for holding a second round for seeking the parties’ final opinions on the proposals for electoral reform, which are supposed to be finalised through a gazette notification by the end of this month. But the unresolved BNP issue has been delaying all that.

Leave a Reply