Situation doesn’t demand army deployment: CEC

Terming the present environment very election-friendly, Chief Election Commissioner Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad on Saturday said no situation has arisen so far that requires the deployment of army ahead of the December-30 municipal election.

“The overall situation is under control of them (regular law enforcement agencies). There’s no tension anywhere,” he said.

The CEC made the remark after a coordination meeting of the Election Commission here with law enforcement agencies and local administrations over security measures to be taken for the countrywide municipal elections.

The meeting started at 11:10am at BIAM auditorium with CEC Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad in the chair and it continued till 1:30pm.

The chiefs of the Police, Rab, BGB, Coast Guard and Ansar as well as different intelligence agencies, representatives from the Armed Forces Division, Divisional Commissioners, Deputy Commissioners, Superintendents of Police, returning officers joined the meeting.

Four election commissioners -- Mohammad Abdul Mobarak, Abu Hafiz, Md Zabed Ali and Shah Nawaz— and EC Secretary Sirazul Islam were also present at the meeting.

Talking about the election atmosphere, the CEC said the law enforcement agencies and local administrations informed the Election Commission that the situation is still very friendly for elections.

On November 24, the Election Commission announced the election schedule for 234 municipalities out of the country`s 323 ones.

According to statistics provided by the Commission, a total of 12,045 candidates --923 mayoral, 8589 general councillor and 2533 women councillor contenders in reserved seats— are contesting the polls in the 234 municipalities across the country.