Dhaka, Oct 10 (IANS) Bangladesh’s Election Commission may advance the general elections by three months to October from December 2008, despite political and logistical problems.
Civic elections to five city corporations — Dhaka, Rajshahi, Khulna, Sylhet and Barisal — between March and April next year may be the forerunner to the general elections.
The voter lists for these five cities will be ready by January, Chief Election Commissioner A.T.M. Shamsul Huda said Tuesday.
“The voter list with photographs (for the entire country) should be ready by July next year if we can achieve our target in line with the projection. And in that case, the (parliamentary) elections can be held before October,” he was quoted as saying by Daily Star newspaper.
Political parties have been clamouring for early polls, but the government of Chief Advisor Fakhruddin Ahmed says the country needs electoral and political reforms.
Huda detailed the poll panel’s comprehensive plan to kick off the countrywide field level task of preparing voter lists on a large scale from early next month.
“We hope 21-26 percent of the task will be done in December,” Huda said.
On July 15, the poll body announced the much-talked-about electoral roadmap for holding the next national elections, stipulating that a voter list would be ready by October 2008 and the stalled parliamentary polls would be held by December.
In its original plan announced April 5, the Commission said the task of preparing the voter lists would start in November, but the work kicked off in August on a limited scale.
One of the logistical problems in holding the polls is the non-availability of an estimated 8,000 laptops required for voters’ enumeration and preparation of photo identity cards.
Two Indian firms were short listed after tendering and the public sector Telecommunication Corporation of India Ltd (TCIL) was finally selected, but the other firm objected to the tendering procedure, which led to the Election Commission backing out.
Huda had earlier said he was resorting to “short cuts”, ostensibly avoiding tendering procedures, to get the hardware on time so that the schedule does not suffer.
He said Tuesday that the Commission has so far received 1,950 laptops and other accessories as donation and was now receiving equipment it had ordered.
As per the panel’s plan, a total of 7,215 laptops will be used for preparing voter lists.