EC allows Jamaat leaders to remain candidates

The Election Commission has rejected a plea against allowing Jamaat-e-Islami leaders to run in the general election.

“There isn’t a legal option to cancel their candidacies,” said Election Commission Secretary Helal Uddin Ahmed on Sunday evening.

The High Court had ordered the Election Commission to swiftly decide on a plea which said 25 leaders of the unregistered party were set to contest in the Dec 30 election as independent candidates and on behalf of alliance partners.

On last Tuesday, the judges ordered the commission to decide within three working days whether or not to allow these candidates from competing.

A High Court order in 2013 stripped the registration of Jamaat-e-Islami, a political party that had actively opposed the Liberation War of Bangladesh in 1971.      

On Friday, a delegation of the ruling Awami League headed by HT Imam visited the Election Commission to urge it to stop Jamaat leaders from running in the election.

“They lied in their nomination documents. They claimed to be leaders of the BNP, but that is not true as we have found out through media reports. They presented false information, a ground for termination of candidacy,” Imam, political adviser to the prime minister, had said.

As for the several BNP nominees whose candidacies were stayed by courts, there is no scope to cancel voting in their constituencies or allow alternative candidates from their party, said Secretary Ahmed.

The commission has issued a new polls schedule for Gaibandha-3 because of the death of candidate Fazle Rabbi from Jatiya Party (Kazi Zafar), who was nominated to run using the BNP’s ‘paddy sheaf’ symbol.  

The final day for submitting nomination documents for that seat is Jan 2 and polling will take place on Jan 27.