Ivy’s hattrick win in NCC election

NARAYANGANJ, Jan 16 (Agencies): Awami League mayoral candidate Selina Hayat Ivy on Sunday created history as she unofficially won the high-voltage Narayanganj City Corporation (NCC) election for a record-breaking third time in a row.

Ivy, also the country's first female city mayor, secured a landslide victory by defeating independent mayoral candidate Taimur Alam Khandaker with a margin of 69, 102 votes.

She bagged 1,61,273 votes while her nearest contestant Taimur Alam polled 92, 171.

Returning officer Mahfuza Akter announced the results when the vote counting completed.

With the latest victory, Ivy is the first city mayor to win the polls for the third consecutive term.

Meanwhile, some 50 per cent voters cast ballots in the Narayanganj City Corporation election, said Secretary of the Election Commission (EC) Md. Humayun Kabir Khandaker.

Another report adds: Election Commissioner Mahbub Talukdar described the election of NCC as the best among all city polls held in last five years.

"Among those city corporation elections held in past five years, the NCC poll is the best according to my opinion," he said at a press after visiting the poll centres.

Out of the 7 mayoral candidates, Ivy contested the election with the "Boat" symbol while Taimur Alam with "Elephant" symbol.

Ivy was previously elected twice, in 2011 as an independent candidate when she became the first woman to be elected as mayor in the country, before reelection as the ruling Awami League candidate in 2016.

The voting started at 8am and ended at 4pm. However due to the slow pace of Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) and presence of voters in some centers of Bandar upajila, voting continued after 4 pm.

Narayanganj Deputy Commissioner Mostain Billah said the voting took place almost totally peacefully, although may have lagged a bit due to voter's inexperience with electronic voting machines.

Ivy cast her ballot at Deobhog Kalarab polling center around 9:30 am while Taimur cast his vote at Masdair Islamia Fazil Madrasha around 10 am.

Both of them expressed dissatisfaction over the slow pace of EVM.

Joint Secretary of Election Commission SM Asaduzzaman said seven candidates contested for the post of the NCC mayor, 148 candidates for 27 ward councilors post while 38 women for conserved seats for women.

This time the number of enlisted voters was 517,357, including 257,519 females and 42,418 first-timers.

Taimur conceded defeat, but alleged "election engineering" by the administration and "fraud through EVMs". "I don't consider this defeat as a defeat," he said at a press conference at his home in Masdair.

"People came to vote in a festive mood, but they could not cast their ballots. The machines were slow, and they were engineered from the inside. Otherwise, the difference would not be so huge."

"It was a government versus people game; government versus Taimur Alam Khandaker."

Taimur expressed frustration over the police and administration's 'activities' before the polls. "People who had been busy campaigning were detained. Arrests began after Awami League leaders had come over from Dhaka."