Big fishes were out of EC's reach: Shujan

The Election Commission (EC) was selective in exercising its power against the candidates who violated the code of conduct in the recently-held Cumilla City Corporation (CCC) election, said Shushashoner Jonno Nagorik (Shujan).
"In case of violation of rules, the commission was somewhat strict about exercising its power against small fishes, leaving big players of the city polls on the loose," said Shujan Secretary Badiul Alam Majumder.
He said these at a press conference on "Shujan's analysis of affidavits of elected public representatives of CCC election" organised at Dhaka Reporters Unity (DRU) in the city's Segunbagicha area.
Apart from Mr Majumder, the programme was also addressed by Shujan executive member Prof Robayet Ferdous, its national committee member Ekram Hossain and central coordinator Dilip Kumar Sarker.
Mr Majumder said, "Though the EC demonstrates its competency by enforcing laws, it couldn't exhibit in the Cumilla city polls."
He said the commission took some actions against some councillor candidates who are not more than "small fishes" in the election scene while "big fishes" were out of the commission's reach. "Such selective behaviour of the election officials raises a question whether they are performing their duties as per their oath," he said.
Besides, there were questions about the electronic voting machines (EVMs) which were used to cast votes in the city election, he said, adding: "Due to slow vote-casting in EVM, many people couldn't cast their votes."
The commission has no authority to deprive the people of their voting rights, the Sujan secretary said.
In a presentation, Mr Sarker said analysing the educational qualification of the 36 elected public representatives out of 37, about 47.22 per cent or 17 representatives are either undergraduate or graduate while 25 per cent studied up to SSC level or below.
Comparing to the last city polls held in 2017, educational qualification of election winners has increased which is a good sign, he said.
Business (80.77 per cent) is the most common profession of the elected public representatives, he said, adding that apart from new Mayor Arfanul Haque Rifat, 21 out of 26 councillors are also businessmen.
However, seven of the nine councillors of reserved (woman) seats are homemakers by profession.
In terms of criminal offences, there is currently no case against the elected mayor though he was one of the accused in a murder case earlier.
Besides, nearly 36.11 per cent (13) of the elected public representatives are accused in any cases currently while there were cases against the same number of councillors in the past.
On June 15, Awami League-backed candidate Arfanul Haque Rifat has won the CCC mayoral race, bagging 50,310 votes while his rival independent candidate Monirul Haque Sakku got 49,967 votes.
The voter turnout was estimated to be around 60 per cent in the CCC polls.
A total of five candidates contested the election for the mayoral post while 106 for councillor posts and 36 for reserved seats.

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