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Published : 21 Jun 2023, 09:30 PM
Awami League leader AHM Khairuzzaman Liton has been re-elected mayor of Rajshahi for the third time while the ruling party candidate Anwaruzzaman Chowdhury has won in Sylhet.
The returning officers announced the results on Wednesday evening after daylong voting amid a boycott by the BNP and the Islami Andolan Bangladesh.
Liton bagged 160,290 votes while his nearest rival was the Islami Anodolan’s Murshid Alam with 13,483 votes despite the boycott.
Anwaruzzaman won 119,991 votes while his nearest rival the Jatiya Party’s Nazrul Islam Babul got 50,862 votes.
Liton, son of independent Bangladesh’s first home minister AHM Qamaruzzaman, was elected mayor for the first time in 2008. He lost the post to the BNP candidate Mosaddek Hossain Bulbul in 2013.
A former president of Rajshahi Metropolitan Awami League, Liton was elected mayor of Rajshahi again in 2018.
He was made a member of the party’s presidium in 2021.
Anwaruzzaman, a joint secretary of the party’s overseas unit in the UK, was dubbed an “outsider” by many in and out of the party, which suffered infighting in Sylhet. The boycott by the BNP, however, almost put him on course for a win.
Analysts said it would be challenging to bring voters to the polling stations in Sylhet and Rajshahi after the Islami Andolan, which drew a significant number of votes in Gazipur, Khulna and Barishal, announced a boycott in protest against an attack on its mayoral candidate in Barishal.
The supporters of councillor candidates, however, were expected to pack the voting centres.
The names of Islami Andolan’s candidates remained on the ballot as their announcement of boycott came after the Election Commission had allotted symbols.
Chief Election Commissioner Kazi Habibul Awal said a 50 percent turnout in city corporation elections was “good enough”.
The turnout was around 50 percent in recently held elections to Gazipur, Barishal and Khulna city corporations.
In Rajshahi, the turnout was 56.2 percent while it was 46.71 percent in Sylhet.
The ruling party took the mayors’ posts in Barishal and Khulna also, but in Gazipur, former mayor and expelled Awami League leader Zahangir Alam’s mother Jayeda Khaton stunned the Awami League candidate.
