EC distributes only 15pc of smartcards

FE Team | Published: October 06, 2017 00:13:06

The Election Commission (EC) has only managed to hand out smartcards to 15 per cent of voters in Bangladesh in the year since distribution began. The EC had aimed to complete distribution among 90 million voters by December, reports bdnews24.com.
Distribution has been most successful in the Dhaka metropolitan area, with 60 per cent of its 5 million voters. However, distribution has not yet been completed in several wards of Mirpur and Uttara.
The low rate of successful distribution is 'distressing', say officials. Though much was made of the initiative at the start, the work has proceeded at a snail's pace. Bangladesh scrapped a deal with French company initially contracted to produce the cards. Additional problems have cropped up when trying to take fingerprints and iris scans.
"The distribution work was set back due to the negligence of a French company," National Identity Registration Division Director General Brigadier General Mohammad Saidul Islam told the news agency on Wednesday when asked about the current situation.
"We are now handling production and personalisation [inputting the voter's information on the card ourselves."
"The production speed has increased to 5 million cards a month. But we have had delays in procuring fingerprint and iris scan machines."
Though distribution is 'slow' at the moment, it should pick up once the machines arrive in a month or so, he said.
"Work has proceeded slowly in this first year," he said. "We hope national distribution work will proceed apace next year. We hope to distribute at the district level in November and December. We will be able to distribute the cards to everyone in the next 15 months. We can do it, we will do it and we will prove ourselves," the NID wing DG said.