Md Delawar Hossain, the candidate of the 11-party alliance and a leader of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, said he expects to win the Thakurgaon-1 by-election by a wide margin if the vote is free and fair.
He voted on Thursday morning at the Adarsha School centre in Ward 5 of Thakurgaon municipality and then spoke to reporters.
Urging voters to come to the centres without fear, the Jamaat candidate asked everyone to rise above intimidation and vote freely and with courage. He called on them to choose their preferred candidate and help build the Thakurgaon of their hopes.
Concern over ID cards without photos
Asked about the voting atmosphere, Delawar Hossain said polling had only just begun, so it was too early to give a final view. The situation would be clearer after some time, he said.
He said he had noticed that the identity cards of polling officials carried no photographs. The card around the presiding officer’s neck had no photo, he said, and he had heard that the assistant presiding officers’ cards also had none. Without a photo it is hard to confirm whether a person is the real official, he said, raising the concern that someone else could be working in an official’s name. He asked the returning officer to look into it quickly.
Holding a fair election is the responsibility of the government, the administration and those running the vote, Delawar Hossain said. In his view a free and impartial election is possible if all of them are sincere.
He said he hoped that, taking into account the complaints and code of conduct violations up to the previous day, a fair election would be held today that at least respects the people’s choice. That was his expectation of the government, the administration and the election officials.
He warned that if they failed to hold a fair election, questions would also be raised over the credibility of future local and other elections under a party government, and people could lose interest in elections.
Allegation against BNP
The Jamaat candidate also accused BNP activists over an incident. He said that the previous day, in a ward of Rajagaon union, BNP activists dressed one of their own workers in a burqa and sent her out late at night, then caught her themselves and filmed it. She was not handed over to the police, he alleged.
According to Delawar Hossain, it was astonishing that a party worker had been made to pose in a burqa as if canvassing for votes, then caught and filmed for a TikTok-style video amid celebration. He demanded a proper investigation and swift legal action against those involved, saying this would give the public a sense of transparency and fairness.
BNP’s response to the allegations was not included in his remarks.
Staying in the race to the end
Answering reporters’ questions, Delawar Hossain said he had received complaints that his party’s polling agents had been forced out of some centres. He would look into it and inform the administration.
He said he had also contested the national election on 12 February and claimed he received a strong response from the public then. Within seven months the winning candidate was elected president and moved to Bangabhaban, leaving the seat vacant and giving him another chance to contest, he said.
Delawar Hossain said that in the previous election the winning candidate had called him a good young man, said he had time ahead of him and said that was his own last election. For that reason he firmly believed the people of Thakurgaon would vote for him this time.
The Jamaat candidate said he had no plan to withdraw midway. They would stay in the field to the end and had entered the race to win.
But their next decision would depend on the voting atmosphere, he said. If there was an attempt to hold an election like those in Magura, Sherpur or Bogura, where the whole vote was taken over within two or three hours, responsible people at central and local level would sit and decide, he alleged.
If the election was fair and voters could vote freely, he said, he would accept the result. In a democratic process the result of a fair election must be accepted, he said, but irregularities and rigging would change the situation.
He said that because this is the only election in the country this time, the Election Commission and the administration are keeping a close watch. He wanted to keep his trust in them to the end.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report