The Habibul Awal commission has made quite a few controversial and biased decisions until now. One of the recent such controversial decisions is to ignore active political parties and provide registration to completely unknown ones, which are quite aptly referred to as the “king’s parties.”
Another extremely controversial decision of the election commission is to announce a ban on any anti-election political rallies and activities. This is a blatant effort to undermine the rights of the opposition political parties. After all, the effort to peacefully boycott the election is a constitutionally recognized fundamental right of the citizens. The latest controversial act of the commission was to dismiss the appeal against Barrister Shahjahan Omar’s candidature on grounds of concealing material information in the affidavit filed with his nomination papers.
According to media reports,until a few weeks ago Barrister Shahjahan Omar, Bir Uttam, was a vice chairman of BNP. Previously he was the state minister for law in the BNP government.
Following the violence during the ill-fated grand rally of BNP on October 28, 2023, several cases were filed with the DMP’s Ramna and New Market police stations against the party’s secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir and many of its party leaders and activists as well as many other unidentified persons. They were accused of being involved in the explosion of bombs and damaging vehicles. Barrister Omar is among the accused.
Barrister Omar was arrested on 4 November. He was later granted bail by the court and released on 29 November, though no one else was lucky enough to be given bail in these cases. He then met with the prime minister, joined Awami League and submitted his nomination papers on 30 November in the returning officer’s office to contest in the election with the ‘boat’ symbol from the Jhalokathi-1 constituency.
It may be recalled that in 2005, a High Court division bench, comprising Justice MA Matin and Justice AFM Abdur Rahman, made it mandatory for the candidates contesting in parliament elections to disclose their antecedents in the form of affidavits. Eight types of information to be disclosed in the affidavits include candidates’ educational qualifications, criminal records (present and past criminal cases), and details of income, assets, debts and liabilities of themselves and their dependents [Abdul Matin Chowdhury v. Bangladesh 66DLR (2002)].
This court directive for the disclosure of antecedents of candidates in the form affidavits to be submitted with their nomination papers was subsequently included in Section 12(3)(B) of the Representation of People’s Order,1972.
Barrister Omar included the details of past criminal cases against him in the affidavit form submitted with his nomination papers. However, he failed to disclose the present cases pending against him. In other words, he concealed: the details of the section of the law under which the cases were filed, the case numbers, the court which took the cases into cognizance and the present status of the cases, as required by the election commission
he returning officer did not reject Shahjahan Omar’s nomination papers despite his non-disclosure of material information in his affidavit. Instead, the returning officer used a curious argument to declare the nomination papers of Barrister Omar valid
In addition, there are also serious questions concerning the details of the immovable assets mentioned in Barrister Shahjahan Omar’s affidavit.
In the affidavit submitted during the 11th parliament election of 2018, Barrister Omar had mentioned that he and his wife had agricultural and non-agricultural land worth Tk. 4,587,761. He showed Tk. 17,870,000 as the value of three houses and a building in Barishal and Rajapur. The value of a farm in Dhaka was shown as Tk. 4,824,508. This time, however, he made no mention of any immovable assets, though he showed income of Tk. 1,945,277 from the rent of houses and apartments.
The manual for conducting the 12th Jatiya Sangsad election, recently published by the election commission, states, “3. Providing incorrect information in the affidavit: According to the Representation of People’s Order, 1972, if any candidate does not provide information or provides false information in the submitted affidavit… the returning officer on his own initiative, or… on the basis of an objection raised by anyone, will be able to conduct a brief inquiry and will be able to reject any nomination paper.” In other words, Barrister Omar’s nomination papers should have been cancelled for concealing information regarding the case which are presently pending against him.
But the returning officer did not reject Shahjahan Omar’s nomination papers despite his non-disclosure of material information in his affidavit. Instead, the returning officer used a curious argument to declare the nomination papers of Barrister Omar valid. The returning officer justified his decision, saying, “There is a difference between being accused in a case and being suspected. According to the information required by the election commission, the nomination paper is accepted as he is not accused in the case.”
However, according to the format for affidavit, provided by the election commission, Barrister Shahjahan Omar was required to disclose the details of the cases under which he was recently arrested and then released on bail. In other words, the returning officer used an irrelevant and unjustified explanation to defend Barrister Shahjahan Omar rather than rejecting his nomination papers for concealing material information, required by the election commission.
Of the total 2,720 candidates scrutinized by the returning officers for the upcoming parliament election all over the country, the candidature of 73 candidates were rejected due to discrepancies in their affidavits. Some were rejected as the affidavits were not included with the nomination papers or candidates’ not signing the affidavits. The nomination papers of 18 candidates were rejected as their affidavits were incomplete, false or incorrect, and 20 other candidates were rejected for concealment of information in their affidavits.
Clearly, Barrister Shahjahan Omar’s candidature was accepted despite clearand blatant concealment of information in his affidavit, although the nomination papers of 72 not so fortunate persons were rejected for errors in the affidavits. Will the people of this country get to know the reason behind the biased decision of the returning officer and election commission in favour of Barrister Omar? We feel that the people have that right.
* Badiul Alam Majumdar is secretary, SHUJAN (Shushashoner Jonno Nagorik)