Dhaka: Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) KM Nurul Huda has said that the Election Commission has decided to postpone the election schedule of the 11th National Assembly in view of the demands of the Jatiya Oikya Front along with the BNP. He said, 'We have decided to reschedule. Nomination papers can be submitted till November 28. Voting will be held on December 30.'
The CEC said this after the opening of the EVM Fair at the Bangabandhu International Conference Center (BICC) in the capital on Monday (November 12).
In the schedule announced on November 8, the CEC said that the elections will be held on December 23. But after being indecisive about whether to go to the election or not, the Jatiya Oikya Front together with the BNP held a press conference on Sunday (11 November) and said that they are going to the polls, but in this case they demand to postpone the polls by one month.
The CEC said that following the request of various political parties including the National United Front, the election date has been changed to December 30. And the deadline for submission of nomination papers has been changed to 28 November. We have taken this decision in the commissioners sitting in the morning. The rest of the dates will be decided tomorrow.
As per the earlier schedule, the date for submission of nomination papers was November 19, selection was November 22 and the date for withdrawal of candidature was set for November 29.
At the EVM fair, Election Commissioner Rafiqul Islam said that no cow says her curd is bad. We will also not say that EVM system is bad. So this fair has been done for your opinion. We will use EVMs in the 11th parliamentary elections based on your decision.
Other Election Commissioners and senior EC officials were present at the inauguration of the fair. During the open discussion, the Election Commission accepted the opinions of the visitors.
