By IANS
Dhaka : Thwarted by the cancellation of an order placed with an Indian firm, Bangladesh’s Election Commission says it has resorted to a “secret” method to acquire IT hardware to update voter list and other preparations for holding elections in the country.
“We are going ahead with our secret plan to start full-scale work for preparing the voters’ roll,” Election Commissioner Sohul Hussain was quoted by New Age as saying.
“Though it is now going on in secret, you will know every detail of the (procurement) procedure after we receive the 4,000 laptops next month so that no question might be raised. We are keeping it secret (just) to avoid unnecessary obstacles to getting the equipment on time,” Hussain said.
Explaining the reason for keeping the plan “secret”, the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Shamsul Huda, had said on Sep 19: “We will not say how we are going to get the laptops. There are many people who may try to foil the plan.” He did not elaborate.
A government panel stepped in at the last stage to cancel awarding of a contract for 8,000 laptops and related IT hardware to an Indian firm earlier this month after another Indian firm objected to the selection procedure.
The panel also asked the commission to invite fresh tenders for the job as it found anomalies in the previous bidding process.
However, the EC’s case is that at least two months will be required to complete the process for awarding the contract through a fresh round of bidding. But, according to the election roadmap announced by the commission, the “procurement and deployment of ICT infrastructure” is supposed to be completed by October.
The commission already has received around 1,800 laptops as donations from different agencies. With these it started updating voters’ list in some areas last month.
The CEC on Sep 19 expressed his determination to start countrywide voters’ roll preparation work from next month after procuring the laptops according to their ‘secret’ plan.
Keeping the poll preparations schedule, including issuing of multipurpose photo identity cards, is vital for Bangladesh where general elections, called off in January this year amidst political turmoil, are scheduled for end-2008.
To donor nations, including the US, who have emphasized on early free and fair polls to restore democracy, Chief Advisor Fakhruddin Ahmed’s caretaker government has promised advancing of the timetable if the preparations are completed before schedule.