Editorial
Discordance over timing of upazila polls
Hold them with parliamentary elections
LGRD and Cooperatives Adviser M Anwarul Iqbal has stirred further the not-so-placid waters by announcing a timeline for city corporation and municipality elections in April and the upazila polls in May. Thereupon the Election Commission (EC) has given to understand that they are yet to determine the timing of the upazila elections. As far as we understand, according to a latest decision of the government, the rules of the local polls are to be formulated by the EC. By the same token, why mustn't they decide on the local election schedules?
In the essence, going by the original EC road map, upazila elections were to be held in October while the rest, including the UP elections, were scheduled for sometime before December, just preceding the national polls.
LGRD and Cooperatives Adviser has spoken of going for elections to 100 of 485 upazilas in May, obviously because voter-list with photographs will be ready for that many upazilas by that time. The question is: why this piecemeal conduct of upazila polls whilst having them in one go should be logistically convenient and financially cost-effective?
Now, the mainstream political parties have in a chorus demanded that parliamentary elections be held before local government elections. They are apt to say that is what the caretaker government and the EC are mandated for. Besides, they add, it might 'complicate' the preparations for national elections, apart from the fact that the results of the local government polls, although held on a non-party basis, could influence the outcome of the parliamentary elections.
When such different voices are heard over the timing of the upazila elections, we are reminded of an editorial we wrote on this subject wherein we advocated for the simultaneous holding of the national and local polls. Our argument was it would be a cost cutting approach in a poor country to a series of elections we must stage for establishing democracy on firm foundations.
Moreover, this is a potential problem-solving angle we can take given the differences of opinion on the timing of the local government elections.
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