EC to invite parties to reform talks next week

FE Team | Published: August 21, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

The Election Commission (EC) starts writing to political parties next week to discuss long-pending electoral reforms, the chief election commissioner (CEC) said Monday, reports bdnews24.com.
The commission will also send drafts of the electoral laws to the parties along with the letters, CEC ATM Shamsul Huda said.
"We'll invite the political parties with a tentative date. If there's any problem from their end, the parties can tell us when it would be convenient for them. It won't be a problem, we'll sort it out on consensus," Huda told reporters at his office.
The chief polls official said the commission would make another spell of efforts to ask the government to open indoor politics unless it is originally gone by the end of this month.
"If we see it's not happening by August 30, we'll ask the government for this," he said.
"As per the election roadmap, we're scheduled to start discussion with the political parties in September. I hope the ban on the indoor politics will go by this time. We have announced the roadmap only after consultation with the government."
He was asked to comment on if any problem would arise involving the matter since some major political parties are facing trouble because of a leadership crisis and so-called reforms.
"I think it's a matter of the two major parties (Awami League and BNP). We've planned to call them in alphabetic order. If they think they're not ready, we'll call them later," he said.
He said election officials were "successfully" registering voters in Rajshahi, Mymensingh and some other areas after Sreepur model.
He said they had received "huge response" from people in preparing the electoral roll with photographs.
He was confident that there was no scope for cheating since fingerprints would be another part of the list along with photographs.
The Awami League and the BNP have already announced that it will not be possible for them to sit with the commission unless the ban on indoor politics is gone.
On April 4, the CEC met Law Adviser Mainul Hosein and asked the government to lift the ban on indoor politics. But the request did not get through.
A day later, the CEC unveiled a draft of the electoral laws.
On July 15, the EC announced a roadmap saying that the next elections would be held anytime between October and December next year.