Don’t run away from polls, CEC asks political parties

Chief Election Commissioner Kazi Habibul Awal on Sunday asked the political parties to stay in the election field saying that the Commission will fail if all political parties don't cooperate with it.

"You must have a concerted effort. If someone stands with a sword, you should stand with a rifle or another sword. If you run, what do I do? We will help. We'll have command over the police and the government," he said.

The CEC made the remarks at the meeting with a team of Nationalist Democratic Movement (NDM), which was held at the Nirbachan Bhaban here, opening the EC's dialogues with registered political parties.

"We can't stop the violence. You (political parties) also have to take responsibility. You are the players. You play on the field. We're the referees. We've huge power. The power is not less. We'll apply the power," he said.

Habibul asked the people not to judge the existing commission by the performances of the last two general elections in 2014 and 2018. "We'll take responsibility of the elections conducted by us. We will make every effort to make the election participatory and impartial. If all parties do not cooperate, we will fail there," he said.

In response to CEC's statement, NDM chairman Bobby Hajjaj said that the law doesn't permit standing with shotguns. However, the CEC did not make any further comments in response.

BSS adds: the CEC also asked the political parties to take responsibilities for tackling poll-time violence as the political parties play vital roles in the fields of elections.

“The political parties should take responsibilities to prevent violence in polling areas because the political parties are the players in the voting field. They will play in the election fields while we will discharge our duties as referee,” he said.

Earlier in the morning, he said in his opening speech: "We have stated many times that it is very necessary for all the political parties, especially the major parties, to participate in the elections.”

The CEC cannot force any political party to participate in elections, he said, adding that however, the EC will repeatedly call all parties to participate and this effort will continue.

“If there is no rivalry and competition in the election, there is no accurate reflection of the public opinion,” he continued.

The CEC further said Bangladesh is constitutionally a multi-party democratic republic.

He said there is no constitutional bar to a single party which can form a government by winning 300 parliamentary seats in the polls.

But as per the history, he said democracy will embrace unnatural death soon in that case.

He added that dictatorship will be emerged further and the restoration of democracy will become tough.

“…We want to hold elections in a favourable environment and for this we need everyone's support,” he said.

Awal urged the non-political and respected people to come forward and apply their wisdom and knowledge to call the political parties in the dialogues so that they could reach a political consensus in the upcoming elections.

The Election Commission (EC) started holding dialogues with political parties from Sunday.

On the first day, the EC held dialogue with the Nationalist Democratic Movement (NDM) or Jatiyatabadi Ganitantrik Andolan.