BNP boycotted polls fearing defeat, claims AL leader

The BNP pulled out of city polls fearing imminent defeat, claims Awami League leader Abdur Razzak.

Razzak, chief coordinator of party-endorsed Dhaka South mayor candidate Sayeed Khokon, claimed the move proved that the people did not support the BNP.

“They boycotted the polls realising the people were not with them,” the Awami League agriculture affairs secretary told the media on Tuesday.

His reaction came soon after the BNP announced boycott of the city polls alleging large-scale rigging.

Razzak warned against starting agitations. 

“You (BNP) won’t be successful,” he said.

The BNP endorsed candidates for the city polls although it sat out the 2014 general elections.

It enforced a blockade in January demanding a snap election. The agitation left more than 150 people dead and the economy bleeding.

The BNP said it would hit the streets if the polls were not ‘fair’.

On Tuesday morning, its Chittagong mayor candidate M Manjur Alam said he was quitting the race in the face of widespread rigging.

The party later announced its decision to pull out of all the three corporation polls on the same ground.

Reports of election rigging have come in from several centres in Dhaka. 

Balloting was cancelled at a polling station in Suratoli under Dhaka South after it was attacked and damaged.

A video shot by a councillor aspirant showed supporters of an Awami League-backed councillor candidate in Dhaka South city’s Ward 19 stuffing stamped ballots into boxes at Shiddheshwari Girls’ High School. 

bdnews24.com Correspondent Sajidul Haque found Narinda Govt Primary School voting centre’s Presiding Officer Obaidul Islam stamping ballots for AL-backed Dhaka South mayor runner Sayeed Khokon.

BNP Standing Committee member Moudud at a media conference said, “What took place today was not voting but a joke of democracy.”